


Mobile Suit Gundam: Noble Rogues

by ApeUnit



Category: Universal Century Gundam, 機動戦士ガンダム | Mobile Suit Gundam (TV), 機動戦士ガンダム 第08MS小隊 | Mobile Suit Gundam: The 08th MS Team
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-10
Updated: 2016-09-09
Packaged: 2018-08-14 04:15:50
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 34,189
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7998214
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ApeUnit/pseuds/ApeUnit
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"It is forbidden to kill; therefore all murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets." ― Voltaire. </p>
<p>Takagi is a man of principle; fighting for honor and his duty. Leighton is cruel man; fighting for the life that was destroyed. This is the story of Noble Company and their missions in the One Year War.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Mogadishu Nights

Mobile Suit Gundam:

Noble Rogues

 

Mogadishu Nights

 

**Mogadishu, Africa, Earth**

**April 0079UC:**

             The night was calm and quiet.  A strong breeze blew through the city from the sea.  Corporal Bukowski stood nervously, as he tried to light his cigarette.  In his charge were eight Zeon prisoners of war.  The beleaguered prisoners were captured earlier that day, in the heavy street to street fighting that tore through Mogadishu. 

            One of the Zeon soldiers noticed Bukowski, as he fumbled with the lighter.  The Zeon soldier rose to his feet and moved toward the Corporal.  Bukowski looked up and noticed the light from a small flame.  The flame came from a lighter held outstretched by the Zeon soldier.  He held it steady, with a cupped hand sheltering the flame, long enough for Bukowski to light his cigarette.  It was an act of thoughtfulness, especially from the enemy, that Bukowski had not expected.

“Bukowski!” a voice called out, surprising the young Corporal.

            Lieutenant Horatio Leighton entered the bombed out room where the prisoners were kept under guard.  He was a young Lieutenant, commissioned at the war’s onset and only twenty-five years old.  One side of his face made him look like the poster model of a Federation soldier.  He was clean cut, firm jaw, commanding blue eyes, and combed short hair.  The left side of his face bore his literal battle scar, a deep gash that started above his left brow and ran vertically down his cheek almost to his jaw line.  In his right hand, and held at his side, was the Lieutenant’s M72A1 assault service rifle, the standard issue bullpup rifle of the Earth Federation Ground Forces.        

“What the hell is going on here!?” Leighton demanded.

“Um…sir. Nothing sir!” Bukowski managed, as he awkwardly stood at attention.

            Leighton made his way to where Bukowski and the Zeon soldier stood.  The Lieutenant grabbed the Zeon soldier by the shirt and threw him to the ground.

“Back in line you fuckin’ Zeke!” Leighton shouted.

            Bukowski could smell the alcohol; the Lieutenant had been drinking. 

“Sir, I have things under control here,” Bukowski said, in an effort to mitigate the inebriated behavior.

“Shut your fuckin’ face, Bukowski!” Leighton said, while he shoved a cautionary finger toward the Corporal.

“Good God, no wonder they’re losing this war,” a Zeon prisoner spoke up.  “When they’re led by a drunken officer corps.”

            The rage was palpable when Leighton turned toward the group of prisoners.  A few of them felt a genuine since of fear when they looked in the enraged Lieutenant’s eyes.

“Who fucking said that?!” Leighton demanded.

            There was a silence from the group of prisoners.  Perhaps it might have been a poor choice to upset the drunken Lieutenant with the loaded weapon.  Bukowski was a bit slower to recognize what was happening.  The Lieutenant was a formidable man who held the higher rank.  His orders were to be obeyed.

“Bukowski!” Leighton shouted. 

“Sir!” Bukowski said, as he turned.

“I need you to check in with Sergeant Tupolev.  I need his report on who he is assigning to the day shift patrols.”

“But sir, I am supposed to be guar…”

“Is there a problem here, Corporal?” Leighton interrupted.

            Bukowski was backed into a metaphorical corner.  He was only sixteen years old; drafted into this war because the Federation needed every able bodied citizen to fight.  He ended up as a Corporal simply because he was the only member of his squad to survive a Zeon attack during the retreat at the Golan Heights. 

“I have things under control here,” Leighton said in a reassuring tone.  “Get that report from Tupolev!”

            The only thing to do was salute, which Bukowski did.  It was a mixture of the naïveté of youth and the Lieutenant’s intimidation that caused Bukowski to leave.  There was one last stand to attention on the part of Bukowski before he turned and departed.  He made his way out of the bombed out building and onto the street.  This was a section of the city controlled by the Federation, well behind the front line.  There was no fear of snipers in this area, at least.  That caused a sigh of relief from the Corporal.  Not more than a minute had passed before Bukowski could hear automatic weapons fire from the bombed out building; where he left Lieutenant Leighton alone with the prisoners. 

            The entire magazine of the weapon had been expended.  A glow of satisfaction radiated from Leighton’s face.  A heap of dead Zeon lay at his feet.  He did indeed feel very proud of himself.  However, there was movement.  A Zeon, bloodied and bullet marked, pulled himself onto his elbows.  The man had somehow survived the hail of automatic fire.  The surviving Zeon stared back at Leighton with a face that begged for mercy.  Leighton possessed no such sympathy.  The Lieutenant pulled his service pistol from his holster.  With the sidearm aimed directly at the Zeon prisoner’s head, Leighton squeezed the trigger.  The impact of the round threw the man’s head back and his body slumped to the ground. 

            Corporal Bukowski rushed into the bombed out building.  He was met by the ghastly scene of the dead prisoners.  Leighton could only offer a shrug as an explanation, as he exited and left the Corporal alone with the slaughter.

**000**

            The Medea transport came in low over the Indian Ocean.  Its landing site was the Federation Base at the Mogadishu Airport.  The transport flew in an evasive pattern; the pilots had learned quickly that the Zakus liked to direct their weapons fire on incoming planes.  Part of the incoming flight route took them over Zeon lines for a few perilous moments.  Within a few minutes, the Medea touched down on the runway, only met by two bursts of enemy Zaku fire.  Federation ground crews directed the transport, as it taxied to the fortified terminal building. 

            Naoko Takagi sat calmly, as the transport made its perilous landing.  His stoic demeanor displayed his collectiveness.  In his lap was tucked his copy of Clausewitz’s _On War_.He was a recently commissioned officer, advanced to the rank of Captain.  A graduate of the Federation’s Space Academy at Baikonur, he had ambitions of a career in Federal military service aboard one of the fleet’s space cruisers.  Instead, Takagi was hastily commissioned and ordered to the East African Front, his training completed in Johannesburg after the fall of Baikonur.

            The orders in Takagi’s possession simply stated he was to assume command of Noble Company.  Noble Company was the twelfth company attached to the 7th Regiment of the 5th Army’s 8th Brigade, in a fire support role.  This meant they were issued anti-armor rockets and ordered to seek out enemy Zaku’s for destruction.  Noble Company pursued this objective at a heavy cost.  Takagi knew he was to assume command from the company’s acting commander, Lieutenant Leighton.

            The transport rolled gracefully to a stop at the designated spot.  The ground crew acted quickly and chocked the transport’s wheels.  The loading ramp was opened to allow the passengers to disembark.  Takagi stepped out, his enthusiasm was shadowed by the subdued expression of duty that shown on his face.  The sun was starting to rise over the Indian Ocean.  Its rays blanketed the costal runway in a morning haze.  The city could have been regarded as almost scenic.

            The tranquility was interrupted by the screech of a pair of FF-3 Saberfish fighter jets, as they throttled their engines and took off in formation.  The jets banked right and skimmed low across the city; flying as close to the tops of the buildings in order to avoid enemy radar targeting systems.  It was a sight that energized Takagi.  His years at the Academy and the accelerated combat training had readied him for this.

            The soldiers disembarking the Medea, all replacements for depleted units, were directed into the main passenger terminal.  Terminal One of the Aden Adde International Airport was a scene of horror and pandemonium.  The wounded from the Battle for Mogadishu were strewn throughout the passenger waiting areas.  They were tended to by a handful of overburdened and poorly supplied medical staff.  Left and right the wounded screamed in agony, their cries echoing through the terminal.  Blood collected in puddles; runoff from the wounds of the dying.  Takagi held his composure, clinging to his military discipline.  The other replacements that had disembarked were quickly losing their own.  Their faces bore the expression of panic. 

A line of medics lifted stretchers of the critically wounded.  They were to board the Medea for immediate transport to more suitable medical facilities.  Shouts were heard from the runway; Takagi and the others looked to see the source.  A mass of Federation soldiers ran at full speed toward the transport, in an effort to force their way onboard.  They were so numerous that their effort to climb aboard could only swap the transport.  The desperation of these men to desert their posts and flee the battle only further served to unnerve the replacements.  An overwhelmed contingent of MP’s tried in vain to stem the tide, and force the soldiers away from the Medea.

“Captain Takagi!?” a voice called with inquiry.

            Takagi spotted a young Corporal, who looked to be scanning the group of arrivals.  He made his way over to the voice.  The Corporal snapped to attention and saluted his superior.  Takagi returned the salute.

“Corporal…?” Takagi asked, expecting a response.

“Bukowski, sir!” the Corporal replied.  “I received orders from battalion headquarters to meet you here and bring you to our lines.”

            The Captain nodded in acknowledgement.  He handed his rucksack to Bukowski’s outstretched hand and followed the Corporal out of the Terminal.  On the stretch of road in front of the Terminal, where taxis had once discharged passengers, lines of ambulances deposited the wounded.  Bukowski led his new Captain to a parked M72 Lakota jeep, complete with a gunner manning the M229 machine gun.

“Had to bring a gunner,” Bukowski explained.  “They steal vehicles if you leave them unattended. The Lieutenant would kill me if I lost Noble Company’s jeep.”

            The only way Takagi could respond was with a perplexed expression on his face.  Bukowski placed the Captain’s bag in the rear of the jeep and climbed into the driver’s seat.  The motor fired up and the jeep took off, once Takagi had taken his seat.

**000**

            The war had been going disastrously for the Earth Federation.  On every front, the Earth Federation Ground Forces were in retreat.  Zeon’s deployment of their mobile suits had proved highly effective.  There simply was no weapon in the Federation’s arsenal to effectively counter the Zaku.

            The 5th Federation Army had been initially tasked with defending the Eastern Mediterranean.  In the month since the Zeon invasion, the 5th Army had been driven from their headquarters in Istanbul to their current position in Mogadishu.  With their backs to the sea, the Federal soldiers dug in and turned the city into a fortress.  If the Zeon wanted it, they would have to pay a high price for every street; for every block and building.  For the first time in their war, the front line had stabilized for the soldiers of the 5th Army.  The urban environment severely hampered the tactical advantage of the Zaku’s high mobility.  Strategically placed Federation rocket teams had set about ambushing Zakus.  Firing their anti-armor rockets from bombed out buildings; they had managed to destroy a few of the Zeon mobile suits and forced the Zeon to rethink their strategy. 

            The Battle for Mogadishu was entering its third week.  The 5th Federation Army was severely depleted in terms of men and material; they were exhausted.  The Zeon force, while it outnumbered the Federation force, was dangerously overstretched.  The initial advance had turned out to be more successful than previously anticipated.  The danger for the Zeon African Front lay in the fact they had not incorporated the success into their resupply plans. 

Orbital landing zones, to receive supplied from the space fleet, had been preselected in areas throughout Turkey, Palestine, and Egypt.  Once these areas had been captured, Zeon engineers began work, according to the prearranged plans, constructing landing sites and establishing supply depots.  The strategists on Side 3 expected to still be engaging Federation forces in the Sinai; splitting their retreat between Asia and Africa.  However, that was not the case.  The Federation 5th Army’s resistance deteriorated, in most part due to the effectiveness of the Zakus.  Now, they were pushed to Mogadishu where they made their stand.

The Zeon were now in the midst of a siege with the Federation for control of Mogadishu.  The engineering corps of the Zeon force was actively surveying suitable areas to construct orbital landing zones, but this was taking time.  To receive a landing vehicle from a low Earth orbit, the engineers had to find a landing site with suitable terrain and construct the necessary facilities. These included placing navigational beacons for the descending craft, as well as calculating the landing trajectories.  The orbiting spacecraft would have to adjust their orbits, as required, to hit the drop zones. 

At this point in the Battle for Mogadishu, the orbiting Zeon ships were still aligned to drop on the selected targets in Turkey, Palestine, and Egypt.  Supplies to reach the Zeon force that besieged Mogadishu had to be unpacked from the landing capsules and loaded onto either transport aircraft or trucks.  They then had to travel the vast distances to the Zeon front lines.  The entire time the supply transports were targeted by audacious Federation fighter pilots, who undertook daring raids deep behind the enemy’s lines to strike at the convoys.

The advance to Mogadishu had been successfully detrimental.  The Zeon high command presumed the battered 5th Federation Army had no fight left and its destruction was inevitable.  The needs of conflicts on other fronts required Zeon soldiers to be diverted from the Mogadishu siege and sent elsewhere.  Civilians in some overrun population centers began to mount an insurgency against the Zeon invaders.  This required even more troops to be pulled from the front to secure Cairo, Tel Aviv, Damascus, and Istanbul, to name a few.  And so, the days past and the Federations 5th Army faced a weakening opponent.  All they had to do was wait for their opportunity.

**000**

            Lieutenant Leighton sat inverted in the cockpit of the downed Zaku.  Noble Company brought down the enemy’s mobile suit a few days prior, in the heart of the Bakaaraha Market.  The Zaku had gotten turned around when out on patrol.  Leighton and other members of Noble Company were tasked with guarding this section of the city.  When the Zaku wandered into their sector, they hit it with a well targeted barrage of anti-armor rockets.  The Zaku saw its knees blown off; the goliath lumbered as it came crashing down over the roof of a shop.  The machine lay with its back arched over the shop, its head in the ground, and its chest facing upward.  

            The way the mobile suit was positioned meant one had to sit upside down when in the pilot’s seat.  Leighton was in there.  He had hardly left the Zaku since he and his men shot it down.  Every waking off-duty hour was spent going through the Zaku’s computer; leaning how the Zaku operated, how to operate the Zaku, how to find the Zaku’s weaknesses.  Leighton was an engineer before the war, so he was as good as any to do what he was doing.  He had his reliable MIL-Book rugged laptop computer, from his pre-war orbital work, plugged into the Zaku.  The MIL-Book downloaded the Zaku’s data and ran algorithms.  The hours he would spend sitting upside down caused Leighton severe headaches.  The headaches were remedied by his already problematic drinking habit.

            The jeep with Bukowski and the new Captain pulled up to the ruined Zaku.  Sergeant Tupolev stood on a stepladder.  He leaned into the cockpit and assisted Leighton with the data analysis.  Upon seeing the arrival of the Captain, Tupolev snapped to attention and announced the superior’s arrival to all within close earshot.  Leighton seemed disinterested, as Takagi exited the jeep.  The Captain promptly returned Tupolev’s salute. 

“I’m looking for Lieutenant Leighton,” Takagi said.

“You found him,” Leighton responded, though not taking himself away from his work.

“I am Captain Takagi, and I am to assume command of Noble Company.”

“Good for you,” said Leighton.

“Is this any way to address your superior!? Where is the Regimental CP?” Takagi demanded, a bit disgusted by Leighton’s attitude.

            At this point, Leighton looked up from his work.  He sized up his new Captain, and pointed.  There was a ruined building across the block from where they stood.  The top corner looked like it had been hit by a large rocket.  The section was charred black from an explosion and a large part of was simply missing.

“Regimental was there yesterday,” Leighton said cynically, as he pointed to the destroyed part of the building.

            It was evident that the regiment’s commander and their staff had been vaporized.  It was just a lucky shot on the part of the Zeon.

“So who is in command?” inquired Takagi.

“The hell if I know,” Leighton replied, as he turned his focus back to the ruined Zaku’s computer.

“Where is Noble Company billeted? What are our numbers?” Takagi demanded.

“There’s myself, Sergeant Tupolev,” Leighton started.  “Bukowski and Miller gave you the ride here.  Chen, Thompson, and Nguesso better be cleaning the launcher like I told them to.  Do we count Johansen? He got himself blow in half taking a message to the Regimental CP. Guess not? That’s about it.  We lost thirty men taking this Zaku down, including your predecessor, Captain Mitchell.”

            Takagi was a shocked by Leighton’s attitude, even more by the casualties.  A fire-support company was supposed to number eighty men.  Leighton had accounted for seven.  The Lieutenant unlatched the seat restraint and gripped a bar on the panel in front of him.  He let himself fall out of the chair and swung forward on the bar until he landed on the ground.  Now, Captain Takagi and Lieutenant Leighton were face to face.  The hot sun blanketed the area in its rays of heat. 

“By your leave sir,” Leighton said with a demented smile. 

            The flexing of the muscles in Leighton’s face caused tension on the skin around the scar.  The wound began to open in places.  It was a recent addition and had not yet fully healed.  Leighton turned away, with Sergeant Tupolev in close pursuit, taking the MIL-Book of collected Zaku data.

**000**

            It was an eerie calm this night on the front line.  The echoes of gunfire elsewhere in the city could be heard, but there was none here.  The demarcation between the Zeon besiegers and Federation defenders was more or less the Jidka Sodonka.  The Jidka Sodonka was a road that ran east to west and divided the city of Mogadishu between the factions.  The Federation soldiers named the street, “Zeon Avenue”. 

            Leighton was on the top floor of a three story building on the northern edge of the Bakaaraha Market.  He held a pair of night vision binoculars and was flanked by Captain Takagi to his right and Sergeant Tupolev to his left.  On the floor below, Bukowski and Chen were attaching the rocket tube to its mount.  Nguesso, Thompson and Miller were doing the same in another section of the building. 

            The Zeon had been launching nightly reconnaissance missions to test the Federation lines.  If the Zeon force had been at full strength, they could have easily launched a frontal attack and overrun the hopelessly outnumbered Federation soldiers.  However, the Zeon had fewer men to spare, thanks mostly to their own commanders diverting materials elsewhere.  They still significantly outnumbered the Federation 5th Army, but could not afford the cost of a full frontal assault.  The attack would have to be coordinated and strike at a weak point in the Federation’s line.  That weak point exploited and hole punched through the defensive line; the Zeon crushes the 5th Army in Mogadishu.   

            The relative quiet was interrupted by a distant thud, and then another.  One thud and then one that increased in volume, something big was approaching.  Over a distant building to their front, Leighton spotted the Zaku through his binoculars.  It was a goliath of a machine, over seventeen meters in height.  The Zaku was covered on either side by advancing Zeon infantry.

“We got one tall-boy,” Leighton said into the radio.  “Wait for my signal. Bukowski, you have the pilot’s compartment. Thompson, you cripple the knee so Bukowski can have his shot.”

            There was a radio acknowledgement from both Bukowski and Thompson.  Leighton then went on to address the other Federation soldiers in the area of operation.

“Fox Company,” Leighton started.  “We have the Zaku sighted. Hold fire until we engage and then open up on their infantry.”

            This was the new Federation urban warfare strategy.  The Zeon had come to believe the Jidka Sodonka was the separation between their two forces.  Their Federation counterparts regarded it less so.  The strategy would be to lure Zeon forces into Federation controlled territory.  This was accomplished by either, engaging the Zeon and then falling back in order to elicit a pursuit, or simply to lure them in by an apparent absence.  The Federation soldiers would conceal themselves in the buildings and let the Zeon pass.  The Zakus, between the closely constructed buildings, had next to no room to maneuver.  Even a small torso rotation would often get caught in a collision with a building or take longer than expected because the pilot needed to lift the mobile suit’s arms out of the way.  Once the Federation rocket teams had a clear line of fire, the attack was initiated.  Noble Company had scored three Zaku kills, including the one in the Market, and severely crippled another.  However, the latter had managed to escape back to Zeon lines. 

            The tactic Leighton was studying required two almost instantaneous strikes on a Zaku mobile suit.  One rocket fired was a kinetic energy round designed to target a vulnerable joint area on the mobile suit, the knee for instance.  The compact kinetic energy missile would collide with the knee mechanisms and blow them apart, thus rendering the mobile suit stationary.  Although stationary, the Zaku is still dangerous.  The second rocket fired, know as an inferno rocket, contained a shape charge high explosive warhead designed to melt a small hole through the armor that covered the Zaku’s cockpit.  The exploding warhead propels a jet of molten metal into the cockpit’s interior and incinerates the pilot.  The term was coldly referred to as, “no pilot, no Zaku.”  This strategy was refined heavily since the first Zaku Noble Company brought down, the one in the Bakaaraha Market.  To bring that one down, Noble Company fired nearly twenty rockets at the Zaku’s leg joints. 

            The towering olive drab Zaku lumbered closer to their position.  Leighton estimated the range to target. 

“Zaku, 500 meters,” Leighton said.

            The Zeon mobile suit advanced toward Noble Company’s position.  There were two columns of Zeon infantry on either side.  A few moments passed, though it had the feeling of an eternity.  Even the most calm and collected of the Federation soldiers could feign their expression, but inside they experienced terror.  The Zakus were terror weapons.

“Zaku, 400 meters,” Leighton spoke over the radio.  “We blast that fucker at 300.”

            Then the unexpected happened, the Zaku came to a halt.

“Come on,” Leighton said, talking to himself, but out loud.  “What the fuck are you doing?”

“What’s going on Lieutenant?” Takagi asked, as here peered through his own set of binoculars.

“Did they spot us?” Tupolev said, in his thick accent.

“I don’t know,” Leighton responded; it was clear he was becoming frustrated.

            One of the Zeon soldiers on the street had approached the Zaku’s left foot.  He looked to be an officer.  The Zeon officer opened a small panel on the foot and picked up a phone receiver.  The receiver allowed him to directly communicate with the Zaku’s pilot.  This was an opportunity the Federation soldiers could exploit.  Takagi was one for decisiveness.  He spoke over his own headset.

“Rocket teams, adjust range for 400,” Takagi ordered.  “Fire for effect!”

            Both rocket teams immediately responded to the order.  They made the quick adjustment in the weapon targeting computers and fired their ordinance.  The rockets took off in a bright flash of light.  There was no opportunity to respond by the time the Zeon spotted the incoming rockets.  The first rocket impacted directly on target, blowing apart the Zaku’s left knee joint.  The pieces off flying shrapnel nearly tore the Zeon officer in half, fortunately, for him, he was killed instantly.  The second rocket impacted a few seconds later in the Zaku’s chest, in the location of the cockpit.  Leighton and Takagi had their binoculars trained on the impact site to evaluate the hit.

“Looks like a direct hit on the cockpit,” Leighton announced.

“How can you be certain?” asked Takagi.

“If we missed, the Zaku would let us know. This whole building would’ve been lit up by that thing’s 120 millimeter.”

            The Zaku rumbled and lurched forward to the street below.  There was a tremendous crash, as the mobile suit impacted into the dirt.  A huge cloud of dust flew up from where the Zaku settled.  The Federation soldiers of Fox Company opened fire from their positions in the surrounding buildings.  They targeted the Zeon infantry, now in a panic after the loss of their Zaku.   The elevated fire tore the Zeon infantry to pieces.  They were exposed on the street below with little cover. 

            There was a squad from Fox Company positioned in the same building as Noble, in the floors below Leighton, Takagi, and Tupolev.  The squad opened fire onto the street.  The Zeon soldiers were effectively under an enfilade of fire.  They scrambled to escape the murderous hail of lead.  The fallen Zaku in the middle of the street posed a challenge, as it had to be scaled in order to pass.  A few Zeon soldiers attempted to climb over the lifeless mobile suit, but their exposure made them easy targets. 

            The fight did not last long.  It was over in less than fifteen minutes.  Leighton had a grin on his face.  He grabbed his helmet that was on the ground next to him, and stood up.  The rocket teams were already taking down the weapon systems and stowing them for transport.  The plan was to relocate the heavy weapons before an overwhelming Zeon force returned or an air strike was called. 

“Goddamn it!” Leighton said in frustration.

“What is it?” Takagi asked, as Leighton’s outburst seemed to come out of nowhere.

“Prisoners.”

“What is the deal with prisoners?”

“They’re taking them,” said Leighton, as he pointed to a group of twenty Zeon with their hands in the air.  “We ought to be shooting them dead where they stand. Why are we bothering to take prisoners?”

“The Antarctic Treaty stipulates full quarter be given to prisoners of war,” replied Takagi.

“Since when do Zeon deserve quarter!?”

            After the last retort, Leighton stormed off.  He placed the helmet on his head and slung his M72A1 over his shoulder.  Takagi was starting to become concerned.  What exactly had Leighton inferred by his comments?  Leighton, Takagi was beginning to realize, though brilliant in many ways, was trouble.  Takagi knew it would be prudent to learn more about the man.

“What did he mean by that?” Takagi turned to Tupolev and asked.

“The man has cause to hate Zeon,” Tupolev replied, though it was clear he was uncomfortable with the question.

“What do you mean?”

“I…It is not my place to be saying, Captain.”

“What do you mean ‘He has cause to hate the Zeon’? Is there something about the Lieutenant I should know about?”

            Takagi felt confident he had maneuvered Tupolev into awkward position.  The Sergeant, Takagi had observed, was fiercely loyal to his Lieutenant and to the chain of command.  Tupolev would want to protect Leighton, but felt a duty to obey the superior.  Takagi needed to know what to expect from Leighton.

“I am sorry sir,” Tupolev said, he had played his hand that he would not talk.  “I feel this is something you must discuss with him. I beg your leave sir, to oversee the dismantlement and transport of the rocket equipment.”              

            Tupolev snapped to attention and saluted Takagi.  A gesture that Takagi returned although disappointed.  Then, the Sergeant departed down the access stairs to where the rest of Noble Company was actively dismantling the rocket launchers.

            Leighton walked along the ruined Zaku.  Around him the members of Fox Company looted the dead Zeon soldiers for personal effects and rounded up those who had surrendered.  The Lieutenant was transfixed by the mobile suit.  The machine was a leviathan, unlike anything mankind had ever built before.  He had so wanted to pilot one.  Not just exclusively in a combat role, but for his personal amusement.  He wanted to test the mobile suit’s limits, pilot it through space, and put it though an entire battery of things.  It was a shame they had to use the inferno rocket to bring it down, in a way.  Leighton wanted to open up the cockpit and examine the systems.  The inferno round, to kill the pilot, had melted the cockpit’s interior.  The systems were incinerated.

            A flight of four Federation FF-3 Saberfish screeched overhead.  Leighton stared up at the night sky and the planes.  Their arrival meant the Zeon had called in air support.  Luckily, someone at the Federation air defense station was doing their job, spotted the Zeon jets, and had air assets in the area to divert for intercept.  The urgency on the street increased.  The soldiers scattered to get out of the open.  Noble Company’s jeep was parked in the alley behind the building they occupied for the fight.  The crates that contained the rocket components were loaded in.  Bukowski jumped into the driver’s seat and Takagi into the passenger’s, as Chen and Miller also climbed in the back.  The Corporal put the jeep in gear and took off south toward the Bakaaraha Market.     

**000**

            The dawn had come and the day was already hot.  It was only April, but the temperature in Mogadishu had soared.  It was unseasonably hot, even for this part of the world.  The climate of Earth had taken a dramatic shift.  It had been rapidly shifting ever since the Zeon had purposely crashed the colony from Side 2.  The massive space colony had meant to strike a Federation military target in South America, but it deviated from its intended course.  It had slammed into Sydney, and the Eastern portion of the Australian Continent ceased to exist.

            Leighton was seated in the shade provided by his prized fallen Zaku in the Bakaaraha Market.  In his hand was a crumpled photograph of three individuals, himself, a beautiful woman he embraced, and an infant child.  He gazed at the photograph with an expression of sadness.  From his tactical belt, Leighton removed a small flask.  He opened the top and took a drink from it.  It was not long before the liquor turned his grief to anger.

            Takagi was meeting with Fox Company’s commander, Captain Park.  It was a room in a basement situated away from the combat.  There was a table in the center, around which were seated the various company commanders.  Park was the natural choice to take command of the 7th Regiment, since the stray Zeon round eliminated the previous commanders.  The 7th Regiment should have numbered 1100 men to be considered full strength, they had less than 400.  While Federation unit commanders all over Mogadishu had issues maintaining discipline, controlling the panic mongering, and organizing effective strikes against the Zeon, Park had none of these.  This may have been due to the fact she was teacher at a well to do preparatory school before the war.  Maintaining discipline, whether over privileged affluent children or soldiers of an army suffering a complete morale collapse, was an area in which Park excelled.

“So we brought down a Zaku last night,” Park began.  “We have showed the Zeon that we can fight them, that they aren’t as invincible as they had grown so accustomed. While we have demonstrated that we can change our tactics, they will most likely respond in kind with a change of their own. The key is to stay one step ahead of them…Captain Takagi, you’re a studied soldier. Tell me what you think?”

“They expect us to react to their movement,” replied Takagi.  “This whole war we have been the ones on the run. They attack, we retreat. In the city, we wait for them and ambush them when they approach. We have maybe a short time before the Zeon come to their senses and adapt. They will eventually stop wandering through the streets blindly. Instead, they’ll mass their attacks, level the buildings, leave us nowhere to hide, and overwhelm us.”

“What are you suggesting we do then?” Captain Durand, Golf Company’s Commander, asked.

“We attack,” Takagi replied.  “Nothing big, but a small incursion into Zeon lines to throw them off guard.”

            The whole room was quiet.  This was the last thing anyone had expected.  The rumors circulated that the 5th Army was to be evacuated by the Navy and relocated further south on the continent.  Others suggested the 5th Army was on the verge of capitulation, and surrender was already under negotiation.  Panic and defeatism had infected the 5th Army severely.  They believed the Federation could no longer win the war.  Those left were more in favor of staying alive.

“That is suicide,” interrupted Lieutenant Johnson, Able Company’s Commander. 

“We can’t go along with this,” piped in Captain Soliani, of Jolliet Company.

            The commanders had devolved the conversation into senseless bickering.  It was clear they were against the attack.  A good many of them were more interested in holding the line until the Army’s commanders negotiated the surrender.  That was a very real rumor.  It was taken as truth, but none could find exact confirmation.  Takagi slammed a fist on the table, as he stood up.  This captured the attention of everyone in the room and they fell silent.

“Enough!” Takagi shouted.  “The last time I checked, this was a Federation Army and not a democracy.  The decision is not yours to make.  Captain Park is in command of the Regiment and the decision is hers.”

            All of the eyes in the room shifted toward Captain Park.  The fate of the soldiers under her command now rested with her decision.

“We have done enough running in this war,” Park spoke to a silent audience.  “However, the consensus of morale suggests an attack as a foolish gamble. Takagi does have a point, and being that he is the only professional soldier here I suggest we listen to what he has to say.”

            Park turned to Takagi.

“I want you to draft a plan of attack,” she said.  “I can allocate the use of Fox and Igloo Companies to support your plan.  If I like it, I will take it to Brigade for authorization.”

            Takagi nodded with enthusiasm.  The commanders in the room felt more relieved.  They believed there was no possibility of the Brigade Commander signing off on the plan, and thus did not have to give it any more thought.  Captain Park had successfully reached an outcome that satisfied both parties.  The meeting continued with a briefing of revised deployments along the front.  A radio station occupied by the Intelligence Corps required defending.  Takagi sat there with the satisfaction that he had a chance to make a name for himself.  This was the opportunity to gain his battlefield glory.  The meeting was adjourned and the officers dismissed. 

**000**

            It was midnight in the City of Mogadishu.  Bukowski was adjusting the rocket launcher he and Chen deployed in the bombed out second floor room.  The building Noble Company occupied, along with Fox and Golf Companies, was at one time a radio station.  Federation military intelligence had used the satellite dishes and antennae on the roof to boost their own equipment.  They were attempting to intercept Zeon radio communication amongst their ground units and signals sent from ones in orbit.  Due to the nature of the work, the radio station was considered a high priority defense point.  It was, however, uncomfortably close to the Zeon lines.    

“Is it true?” Chen asked.

“Is what true?” Bukowski responded, confused.

“That Leighton wasted those captured Zekes.”

            Bukowski paused for a moment, overcome by panic.  Chen immediately picked up on Bukowski’s demeanor.

“So it is true,” Chen said.

“I never said that,” replied Bukowski. 

“A fellow from Golf Company claims he found a bunch of shot up Zeke prisoners. The ones I thought Captain Mitchell left you in charge of guarding.” 

            For several days since the incident with Leighton and the prisoners, Bukowski had been tormented by what had happened.  Perhaps confiding what he knew to Chen might be a way to alleviate the torment.  He had not technically seen anything.  Leighton had ordered him out of the room before actually shooting anyone.  The only thing Bukowski knew for certain was the prisoners were dead and Leighton had that twisted smile on his face.

            Bukowski turned to Chen.  There was a loud whistling and at the same moment Chen’s head flew back.  The man fell to the ground, his head a bloody mess.  The Zeon were launching an attack.  Automatic weapons fire pummeled the façade of the radio station; taking out huge chunks of the concrete exterior with each impact.  Several shoulder mounted rocket propelled grenades slammed into some of the rooms occupied by Federation soldiers.  Their screams were drowned out by the sound of the explosion.  Bukowski hit the floor and covered his head with his hands; oblivious to the fact the helmet already preformed this task.

“Bukowski!” Leighton shouted, as he entered the room.  “Get you head out of your ass and man that weapon. We got Zakus incoming.”

            Leighton raced to the window and took at look at the street below.  There was an avenue that directly approached the radio station and terminated in a “T” intersection at the station’s front door.  Along it were hordes of advancing Zeon infantry supported by three Zakus.  Leighton aimed his M72A1 and fired at the Zeon too close for comfort.  A few fell and the rest scattered for cover.  Bukowski was in a state of panic.

“Chen…Chen’s hit!” Bukowski screamed.  “How’s he doing?”

“He’s dead,” Leighton said, unemotionally.    

“Oh Christ…Fuck! We’re all gonna die!”

            It was clear Bukowski had become unnerved.  The sudden death of his friend had pushed him over the edge.  He curled up on the floor screaming and clutching at his shoulders.  Takagi followed by Miller entered the room.  Miller made his way to check on Bukowski, who he believed to be wounded.

“How the hell did they get this close?” Takagi demanded.  “I thought Able Company was supposed to be on picket duty? Why didn’t they report?”

“Who fucking cares at this point!?” Leighton responded.  “How about we focus on holding the line.”

            Bukowski was in a state of complete terror.  He convulsed on the ground screaming and flailing about.  Around the men of Noble Company in the bombed out room, bullets whizzed and impacted into the concrete.  On the floors above and below, the soldiers of Fox and Golf Companies fired desperately, as they tried to hold back the Zeon onrush.  The Zeon had committed a sizable infantry reserve to this attack.  The street seemed consumed by a never ending flood of Zeon infantry.  Takagi immediately opened up his radio channel to the Brigade command post.

“Sunray this is Noble actual,” Takagi transmitted.  “Are you receiving?”

_“Affirmative Noble actual, go ahead,”_ the voice over the radio responded. 

“Sunray, we have three Zakus at grid Tango-Two. Zeon infantry we believe at battalion strength engaging. Requesting air support, over.”

_“Negative on the air support, Noble actual. Air assets are stretched thin. Do what you can, Sunray out.”_

Takagi let out a grunt of frustration.  They were on their own to hold the position.  In the background, Bukowski was screaming in terror.  Leighton turned his attention to Bukowski in order to motivate his Corporal.

“Bukowski,” Leighton yelled.  “Stop acting like a fucking goddamn coward and get into this fucking fight.”

“…they’re dead,” Bukowski screamed.  “We’re going to die…oh Christ, we’re all gonna die here!”

            The Lieutenant shifted his attention to Miller.  Miller had his arms around Bukowski, in an attempt to console the distraught teenage Corporal.

“Miller!” Leighton barked.  “Get on that launcher and lineup that Zaku!”

            Miller looked back at the Lieutenant; with a look that he felt his place was to care for Bukowski.  Leighton returned the look with one of stern coldness.  Miller instantly lay Bukowski down and moved over to the launcher.  He picked up the controls and sought about ranging his target.  Leighton made his way over to Bukowski.  Bukowski lay on his back; his fingers nervously scratching at his chest.  The Lieutenant grabbed Bukowski with his left hand and with his right; he drew his sidearm from the holster on his belt.

“Is there some fucking reason you’ve lost the will to fight!” Leighton shouted, as he pressed the barrel of his sidearm to Bukowski’s forehead.  “You can die a coward, or a man. The choice is yours!”

“Lieutenant!” Takagi yelled, clearly voicing his abject protest.

            The disapproval of Takagi was flat out ignored by his Lieutenant.  Bukowski stared back into the eyes of Leighton.  The Lieutenant’s eyes seemed to glow with rage, as if the devil himself had manifested all the anger in Hell into Leighton.  The cold barrel of the sidearm burned into Bukowski’s forehead.  There was a long pause.  It felt as though an eternity had passed for the four men in the bombed out room.  There was no doubt among them that Leighton would pull the trigger, this was no bluff.  Bukowski realized this and capitulated.  The Corporal shifted his head to signify his compliance.  Leighton lowered his sidearm, and then holstered it.

“Get to it, Bukowski,” Leighton ordered.

            Bukowski crawled to his knees, as Leighton released his grip on the Corporal’s flak jacket.  The stunned Corporal crawled over to a munitions box that contained the high explosive anti-armor round.  From there, he would assume his place, loading and helping direct the launcher’s fire.  Takagi jerked Leighton by the shoulder; spinning the Lieutenant around and into the hallway outside of the bombed out room.  He wanted this next part to not be overheard by the men.

“What in God’s name do you think you were doing?” Takagi demanded, his face glowing in frustration.

“Esprit de corps, Captain,” Leighton replied.

“Shooting a man is your idea of motivation.”

“Shooting a man for cowardice in the face of the enemy is what I was doing!”

“That is a damned archaic practice. We will court-martial that activity from now on. And I will see you brought up on charges for this incident,” Takagi gave a point of authority in the face of Leighton.

“The court-martial will wait. This is war, and we will do what must be done,” Leighton coldly responded.

            The Lieutenant turned away from the stunned Captain.  Takagi was a man of principle.  He believed that honor was sacred and virtue a noble practice.  By contrast, Leighton stood for and represented all that Takagi despised.  The Lieutenant, to Takagi, seemed to believe this war was a game and they were playing by his rules.

            The first of the three Zakus advanced down the street toward the radio station.  The behemoth lined up its primary weapon, the 120mm machine gun, with the Federation stronghold.  Leighton had just reentered the bombed out room when he saw the Zaku, with its weapon aimed directly at his position.  There was no time to align the launcher and fire a shot.  There was barely enough time for Leighton to order his men to find cover, when the Zaku fired.

            The 120mm rounds tore through the radio station’s façade, shredding the Federation soldiers inside.  Enormous portions of the building’s concrete virtually disintegrated under the unrelenting fire.  Massive holes were bored through the sections where the Federation soldier had set up their own defensive positions.

            The bombed out room soon filled with a choking dust; visibility was severely reduced.  A section of the ceiling collapsed.  Takagi had to shield himself from falling debris.  Leighton got up from his prone position onto one knee.  He noticed something strange by his side.  It was an arm, still wrapped in the khaki sleeve of the Federation uniform.  The shoulder joint was bloodied and mangled.  The Lieutenant looked up.  On the other side of the room, propped up against some rubble, was Miller.  Miller with his left hand clutched the stump where his right arm had once been, coughing up blood the entire time.  Leighton watched as Miller’s eyes rolled back into his head and the private slumped forward. 

“…Jesus fucking Christ!” Bukowski screamed at the top of his lungs.

            A white trail of smoke followed closely behind a rocket.  The rocket exploded in a brilliant flash that blew apart the lead Zaku’s cockpit.  Noble Company’s other rocket launcher was still in action, just above Leighton’s position.  The Zeon behemoth shook violently and then fell to its left; crashing through the adjacent building.  The shot had been a lucky one, as the Zaku pilot had been distracted.  There would not be another. 

            The second Zaku stepped forward.  It had already sighted where the rocket had been fired.  Before the men at the launcher could get another rocket loaded, the Zaku opened fire.  It was a punishing fire.  In the fury of the moment, the Zaku pilot expended his entire 120mm thirty round magazine at the area of the rocket’s origin.  Luckily, the crew of the launcher, Tupolev, Nguesso, and Thompson, had the good sense to abandon their position immediately after firing.  They ducked down a flight of stairs and avoided the retaliation.

            Takagi, Leighton, and Bukowski regrouped with the survivors of Noble Company.  The Captain gave orders to his men to rally the squad leaders of Fox and Golf Companies.  The orders were to hold the radio station at any cost.  It was a vital strategic resource for the beleaguered Federation army.  Unfortunately, Zeon counter intelligent forces identified it as a listening post and ordered its immediate capture. 

            The word was passed amongst the squad leaders of Fox Company to get their men to cover and await the signal.  It had been discovered that the men of Golf Company had fled the building, their stomachs no longer in the fight.  Thompson, Tupolev, and Bukowski were sent to the radio station’s control room, as the last line of defense for the intelligence officers who made ready to sabotage their equipment.  Sergeant Tupolev was given Takagi’s radio clearance with instructions to continuously call for air support until it was granted.  Takagi assumed temporary command of Fox Company, as word had reached him that their newly appointed Company Commander had been killed during the first Zaku’s salvo.  The Captain had the men withdraw to the interior of the building and placed them in cover, to conceal them from the enemy’s sight.

            There was a disquiet silence that overtook the whole city block.  The Zaku had ceased its firing.  The Federation soldiers in the building, that were not dead, were still in cover.  The first platoon of Zeon infantry approached the radio station.  They slowly vaulted over the ruins and entered the structure.  All around them were the mangled and shredded bodies of the Federation soldiers.  Limbs and other body parts were strewn about the rooms closest to the field of fire.  It was a truly horrific sight and unnerved the hardened Zeon soldiers.  A Zeon private stepped through the ruined doorway into a large atrium.  Actually, it was no atrium; the ceiling had collapsed and thus increased the height of the room.

            The Zeon private’s hands trembled, as he held tightly to his submachine gun.  The Federation soldiers that lay dead all around him looked to be about his age.  He was only eighteen and pressed into a war against an enemy fashioned by the propaganda films.  The silence was interrupted by the click of an assault rifle bolt.  The sound a rifle makes when one is chambering a round.  The private happened to glance up, at the missing ceiling.  Stationed around the periphery were Federation soldiers, their weapons trained on the Zeon infantry.  The life of the Zeon private flashed before his eyes.  His miserable war was coming to an end.

            Leighton ordered the contingent to open fire from their elevated position.  The Federation rifles opened in unison.  The shots tore through the exposed Zeon infantry that had wandered into the atrium.  The Zeon private was the first to fall, several rounds fired from Leighton’s M72A1tore through his cheek, stomach, and limbs.  Takagi was on the ground floor.  He ordered the Federation soldiers under his command to rise from their concealed positions.  They stood and delivered a hail of fire into the Zeon, who were already caught off-guard and focused on the elevated attack.

            The initial wave of Zeon infantry that had entered the building were cut down, almost to a man.  They were not deterred, however, and soon a new wave of Zeon infantry poured into the building.  Their numbers were so great that they passed through the murderous fire of the atrium with most of their compliment intact, though a good number were cut down.  The entrance to the building served as bottleneck for the Zeon.  Though they outnumbered the Federation, they could only commit soldiers to the engagement in detail.  The Zeon rushed forward through the bombed out and ruined walls.  Takagi and his men engaged the enemy with a sustained fire at almost point blank range.  But soon, the Zeon were on top of them.  The Federation and Zeon soldiers fought hand to hand for control of the ground level.

            Takagi expended the magazine of his M72A1.  He paused to reload, but was rushed by a Zeon infantryman.  The Captain swung the butt of his rifle and struck down his Zeon attacker.  Another Zeon leaped up and tackled Takagi.  The two wrestled on the ground, locked in mortal combat.  Nguesso wanted to rush to the aid of his Captain, but he had a struggle of his own.  The Zeon pulled a knife from their belt and tried to stab Takagi.  The blade missed and impacted the broken tiled floor.  The hands of Takagi were wrapped around the wrists of the Zeon soldier, as he tried to hold the knife away.

            The scene around Takagi quickly deteriorated.  It was impossible to tell which side held the upper hand.  Just about every soldier was engaged in hand to hand or very, very close quarters combat.  Soldiers violently wrestled each other on the floor.  A Federation soldier would bash the skull of a Zeon soldier in with a chunk of concrete.  A Zeon soldier would throw a Federation soldier onto a piece of exposed rebar; impaling the man.  Takagi felt the tip of the blade pierce into his throat.  With a desperate bit of strength, Takagi kneed the Zeon soldier in the groin.  It was enough for Takagi to take control of the situation.  He flipped the temporarily stunned Zeon soldier onto the ground and seized the knife.

            Takagi now knelt on top of the Zeon soldier.  This whole time, it was a female Zeon soldier Takagi realized he had been fighting.  She seemed to no longer have the strength to put up an effective resistance and slowly raised her hands in a parlay fashion. 

            Several shots rang out.  It was Leighton and his contingent rushing down a flight of stairs to enter the fray.  The new Federation soldiers fired into the onrush of Zeon, cutting them down with effect.  Leighton had a crazed look on his face.  He seemed to be enjoying what was happening, like he was ready to hurt the Zeon.  After Leighton had emptied his magazine, he held the empty rifle in his left hand while he drew his sidearm with his right.  He fired several more rounds at the Zeon infantrymen.  There was a round in Leighton’s pistol he saved.  When he recognized Takagi was in combat he went to assist the Captain. 

            It looked like Takagi was about to take a prisoner.  The Zeon infantrywoman had given up the fight; too tired to continue and soundly bested.  Takagi got to his knees.  He made ready to stand and bring the woman to her feet, when a shot rang out.  The woman’s body went limp and she collapsed, lifeless.  Takagi turned with a rage at Leighton, who calmly dropped the magazine from his sidearm and replaced it with a full one.  A nod of “you’re welcome”, though un-solicited, was given by Leighton.  There was no time to fight with his subordinate over the atrocious behavior.  This was war, as Leighton had previously mentioned to Takagi.  Now, Takagi had to focus on staying alive.

            Their position was untenable, the Zeon force too great.  The men of Fox Company fought gallantly, but their defeat was inevitable.  The Zeon still had two Zakus to commit.  They had hoped to capture the radio station and the Federation surveillance equipment intact, but were also willing to have the Zakus level the structure.  Though, capture of the Federation surveillance equipment would help the Zeon expose the weaknesses in their own communications.

            Leighton fought like a man possessed.  Takagi saw his Lieutenant brandishing his sidearm in one hand, firing wildly, and swinging an entrenching tool with his left.  The pistol had fired its last round; Leighton threw it to the ground.  He was out of spare magazines.  A Zeon soldier rushed forward.  To counter, Leighton buried the spade of the entrenching tool into the side of the Zeon man’s face.  The Zeon fell to the ground and Leighton followed.  He grabbed a cylindrical high-ex grenade from the Zeon soldier’s tactical vest.  With a pull of the handle, Leighton armed the grenade and threw it.  A large explosion engulfed the entrance of the radio station, where the Zeon reserves flowed in.

            The onslaught ceased, as the Zeon did not commit any more troops to the melee in the radio station.  The remaining Zeon inside, which were not in the process of being finished off by the Federals, withdrew.  Takagi stood up to survey the scene.  He turned to see Leighton, whose face was soaked in blood.  The surviving members of Fox Company rallied to Takagi. 

“Your orders, Captain?” One of the sergeants, Ramirez, spoke up.

“What’s our status?” Takagi replied.

“They come at us again…I don’t think we can stop them.”

            Takagi took a look around, at the worn faces of the exhausted men.  Barely one among them was unscathed.  They all stood there, a motley collection of bloodied and battered soldiers.  The Captain took a moment to debate the next course of action in his head. 

            The decision was made for Takagi.  Both of the enemy’s Zakus opened up with a punishing burst from their 120mm guns.  The fire was concentrated at the lower level.  The concrete, already blown away from the earlier fighting, was further reduced to fine bits.  The rounds tore through the collection of Fox Company that still remained.  Some men dove for cover, only to be blown apart as the Zaku rounds tore through walls.  Takagi turned his head to see Ramirez disintegrate before his eyes. 

Rubble covered the area while dust made it impossible to see.  Men were choking, coughing all around.  There were some that tried to escape; they tried to feel their way to an exit.  A one or two made it to the rear door of the radio station and found themselves in a deserted alley.  Others wandered blindly in the wrong direction, and were cut down by Zeon infantry as they emerged.

The Zakus had to stop to reload.  The interior was once again quiet.  The wounded moaned in agony.  Leighton was lying on his back.  He brushed the dust and debris from his fatigues.  The silence was interrupted by a growing roar.  This was not the sound of advancing Zakus.  It had a more aerial distinction.  Leighton recognized it immediately. 

A pair of Saberfish fighters screeched, as they lined up for their attack run.  The Zakus tried to turn and shift their weapons to intercept the Federation jets.  The narrow and ruin choked streets made it difficult to accomplish this.  One Zaku managed to get its arm caught in an adjacent high-rise office building.  The other lost its footing and became unbalanced, as it backed over a property wall.  This Zaku managed to stay upright, but its aim thrown off.  The lead Saberfish locked onto the closest Zaku and fired.

Two high explosive Longbow missiles raced toward their target.  The Zakus, already incapacitated or distracted, were unable to resist.  The missiles found their target; blowing two large holes in the first Zaku.  The explosion killed the Zaku’s pilot and effectively put the mobile suit out of action indefinitely.

The second Saberfish lined up for the attack.  With the aircraft on target, the Saberfish pilot armed and fired two Longbow missiles.  The intense motion of the final Zaku becoming unbalanced was of serendipitous fortune.  It was just enough movement to interfere with the Longbow missiles’ tracking system.  The first missile overshot the Zaku, passing just under the left arm.  It impacted the ground behind, as there was no space for it to turn and reacquire its target.  The second missile, originally locked on to the chest piece, slammed into the Zaku’s left arm and blew it completely off.  This Zaku was still in the fight.

The Zaku’s pilot immediately reacted.  Mounted to each ankle of his Zaku were two rocket pods that contained four anti-aircraft missiles each.  The pilot locked onto the Saberfish that had just attacked, and fired.

The surface to air missile streaked skyward.  The Saberfish pilot rolled his aircraft, flew erratically, and even deployed countermeasure flares.  They were all in vain, as the missile stayed on target.  It impacted, blowing the Saberfish apart.  It was enough to get the lead Saberfish to turn around and abandon the fight.  The soldiers on the ground could hear it leave.

“What the hell are you doing!?” Takagi screamed into his headset.   

_“Area is too hot with anti-air,”_ the Saberfish pilot replied over the channel.  _“I used up both of my anti-mobile suit missiles. All I have left are the incendiaries. They’ll cook the Zeke infantry, but won’t stop that Zaku. Take out the tall-chap and I’ll circle back.”_

Takagi pounded the ground next to him.  He was incensed by the pilot’s behavior.  The thought had crossed his mind to bring the pilot up on charges, but that was not important now.  The carnage in the radio station was becoming apparent to the Captain.  He could see the dead and wounded strewn everywhere.  All the Zeon needed to do now was press their attack, but they hesitated.  It was unsure why. 

“Who’s left?” Takagi shouted.

            A tense silence passed.  Nobody responded to the Captain.  He was about to shout again when Leighton emerged from the dust.  The Lieutenant grabbed Takagi by the flak jacket.

“Will you keep quiet,” Leighton said in a stern whisper.  “I have an idea.”

            Leighton released his Captain and crept away.  He was headed to the rear door of the radio station.  The one that opened to secluded alleyway.  Takagi had the uneasy notion that Leighton may be trying to run, but that seemed unlikely.  Leighton kept low and crept to the rear door.

            In the alley, he found Noble Company’s jeep.  The jeep had remained, even after Golf Company had retreated.  Bukowski feared what the Lieutenant would do if the jeep ever went missing.  The Corporal always took steps to take the keys and disconnect the battery leads.  Resting in the back of the jeep was a shoulder mounted surface to air rocket, colloquially know by its antiquated name the “Stinger”.  Leighton grabbed it along with his MIL-Book and a backpack that contained three extra rockets.

            The roof was the best place to launch.  It was where he would have an unobstructed view of the target.  Leighton raced back into the radio station and then up the stairwell.  A Zaku round had taken out the flight to the next level, so Leighton had to cut across the floor to reach another stairwell.  The Lieutenant ran down the hallway.  The hallway, incidentally, took him by the control room where Tupolev, Bukowski, and Thompson stood guard.

“Misha, come with me!” Leighton said, as he threw the Stinger to Tupolev.

            Sergeant Tupolev followed the Lieutenant; leaving Bukowski and Thompson to remain at their post.  The final flight of stairs had been scaled.  Leighton bashed the roof access door open with his shoulder.  The two men made their way over to the ledge that looked toward the Zeon position and went prone.  They could see Zeon infantry taking up positions in the alleys and ruins that approached the radio station.  600 meters from the radio station was the Zaku.  A group of Zeon soldiers, presumably field mechanics, had gathered around the serviceable Zaku.  They were there to assess the damage. 

“We’re going to shoot that with this?” Tupolev spoke with hesitation.

“Just trust me,” Leighton replied. 

            The Lieutenant plugged a wire from his MIL-Book into a port on the Stinger’s guidance optics.  Tupolev was hesitant for good reason.  The rockets fired from the Stinger launcher were meant to defeat aircraft, not penetrate the armor of a Zaku.  After a few moments, Leighton pulled up the schematics he had obtained from his project Zaku in the Bakaaraha Market.  Ever since he had started analyzing the Zaku, he had been running the schematics through his engineering software.  The search was for the Zaku’s weak points.  Leighton found what he was looking for.  He began to upload the firing solution into the Stinger.  The surface to air missile, though it lacked the destructive force to defeat Zaku armor, was fast and highly maneuverable.  The maneuverability was the key to make this work.

            The rangefinder was activated on the Stinger.  Immediately, the Zaku came to life as it picked up the signal.  Tupolev was confused why Leighton ordered him to acquire the Zaku with the rangefinder.  The Zaku’s sensors could detect target acquisition systems, like the one on the Stinger.  For this reason, Noble Company had always fed preselected targets into their rockets when combating the Zakus.  In this instance, Leighton wanted the Zaku’s attention.

            The ground crew scattered and the Zaku fired up its jump jets to get some elevation.  This would allow the pilot to get a clear shot at the Federation soldiers targeting his Zaku.  Leighton had hoped the pilot would do this very thing.  The target point was locked into to the Stinger and Leighton smacked Tupolev on the back; the signal to fire. 

The Stinger missile jetted out of the launch tube at a high velocity.  The Zaku’s pilot was a bit stunned.  The sensors immediately registered the missile as an anti-aircraft one.  The systems on the Zaku immediately dismissed it because of its low threat probability.  The missile screeched past the Zaku.  The threat rating dropped, as the missile had overshot its target.  Suddenly, the missile banked sharply and lined up for impact.  Leighton had calculated it perfectly.                

The Zaku was still airborne, the jump jets still at full thrust, when the missile impacted.  The target was the thrust port of the Zaku’s own jump jets.  The missile exploded, with enough force it destroyed the valves that safely diverted the jet thrust.  A chain reaction ensued, as the exploding propellant surged back through the lines and into the Zaku’s interior.  The Zaku exploded from the inside.  The metal plates buckled, as fire burst through the tears.  The debris from the Zeon mobile suit rained down onto the street below.   

Leighton managed a genuine smile, proud in his accomplishment.  He tapped Tupolev on the helmet in congratulants.  Tupolev was completely stunned by the whole maneuver.  There was no doubt in the Sergeant; his Lieutenant knew what he was doing.  Takagi saw the Zaku explode.  Right away, he was on the radio and ordering the Saberfish back to finish the job.

The lone Saberfish came in low over the radio station.  Leighton had been uploading the Zeon infantry positions, via his Mil-Book, to the Saberfish’s targeting computer.  Once on station, the Saberfish pilot released his incendiary bombs.  The bombs tumbled down to the ground.  They bounced twice on the street before they erupted.  A mass of fire and heat engulfed the buildings up the street from the radio station.  Every living thing in the radius was instantly combusted.  The immolation of the Zeon forces, caught within the blasts, was enough to convince their reserves to pull back.  Leighton celebrated the achievement with a drink from the flask on his belt.

            The morning sun rose.  The streams of light filtered through the many crevices and holes in the building to illuminate the battlefield.  The soldiers of Noble and Fox Companies, those who were left, could breathe a sigh of relief.  By their fingernails, they had managed to hold their position.  Takagi stood up and walked through the devastated radio station.  Two additional battalions had been sent up to occupy the radio station and the surrounding buildings.  5th Army headquarters had finally recognized the importance of the position and sent a larger force to defend it.  The medics dashed about, as they rushed to tend to the wounded or recover the dead.  Nguesso sat with his back against the wall smiling, as a medic tended a mortal wound on his forehead.  Other infantrymen set about laying sandbags and constructing barriers in order to fortify the position. 

Takagi approached a group of men from Fox Company, the ones still able to stand.  The men all had blank expressions on their faces, but it could also be seen that they were tired.  When Takagi approached they all fell silent.  A Specialist in their number raised his hand and saluted Takagi.  One by one his comrades followed suit.  It was not only a salute given to the rank, but it was also one given out of respect to the man.  Takagi had led them through the night.

**000**

            In the control room of the radio station, one of the intelligence officers started to receive some radio traffic.  It was definitely Zeon and sounded like a pilot on reentry.  Whoever it was, they sounded panicked.  The pilot was screaming about being off course, about structural integrity.  The transmissions were interrupted by static as the voice spoke.  It sounded like a mayday hail.  Then, the communications stopped.  The intelligence office began to catalog the occurrence in the database.

            On the roof of the radio station, Leighton sat in a lawn chair he happened to find up there.  How it got up there was anyone’s guess.  It was midday and the sun was getting hotter.  He had fought all night and was exhausted, but it was too hot to sleep.  In the sky, a shadow caught his attention.

            A large olive capsule was falling; falling toward the city.  The capsule was unmistakable.  It was the massive capsule type that the Zeon used to deliver Zakus and other supplies to Earth from orbit.  The capsule seemed to be wildly off course.  Leighton understood the landing procedure for craft such as those, and there was no place suitable in the city.  The capsule was indeed off course.  The pilot had received hastily calculated entry coordinates.  The designated landing site was to be 40 kilometers north of the city.

For several tense minutes, Leighton, along with a Federation sniper team stationed on the roof, watched as the capsule plummeted toward the ground.  It made a deafening roar, as the capsule desperately fired its retro rockets to control its decent.  The deployed parachutes had already been torn to shreds.  The noise of the thing brought others, including Takagi, to the roof.

            Finally, the capsule slammed into the city.  The point of impact was an old stadium just north of the Jidka Sodonka.  It was in Zeon controlled territory, but still within Federation grasp.  Moreover, these were the capsule types that transported Zakus.  There was little doubt the Zeon in this sector were running low on Zaku units.  Naturally, it could be a safe assumption to presume replacement Zakus were on board.  If the Federation could take that landing site, they could potentially capture working Zakus.

“You wanted your foray into enemy territory,” Leighton said, as he pointed to the crash site.  “There is your opportunity.”

            Takagi smiled with enthusiasm.  This could be his chance to lead an attack, one that could give the Federation an advantage in this war.  It was his duty to lead such an attack.  Leighton supported the idea, though his motives were entirely self-serving.  He wanted a Zaku for his own.  That way he could study it in person and perhaps turn the hated enemy’s grand weapon against them. 

            The soldiers on the rooftop let out a loud cheer at the capsule’s impact.  They felt it was a victory, somehow.  They probably believed their own fighters had shot it down or had somehow forced it off course.

            Leighton pulled the photograph out from his shirt pocket.  The edges were tattered and worn from frequent handling.  It was the photograph of his wife and child, the only thing he had left of them.

“I’ll do it for you Ellie,” Leighton said to the photograph.

            The cheers continued at the downed capsule.  For a demoralized army, it was a nice sight to see an enemy vessel come crashing down.  Leighton placed the photo back into his pocket.  He grabbed his M72A1, which was propped against a dented oil drum, and headed back to a lower level of the radio station.  The plan was to find a cot and get some sleep.  It would be needed in the coming days.

**000**

    

 

 


	2. Hotel Charlie

Hotel Charlie

 

**Federation Lines:**

**Mogadishu, Africa, Earth**

**April 0079UC:**

“What were your losses?” the newly minted Major Park asked.

Park leaned over the table.  The table was covered in charts, maps, and blueprints of the streets and buildings of Mogadishu.  Takagi was with her in the Type 74 Hover Truck.  The hover truck was stopped two blocks from the radio station. 

“Of the eighty eight members of Fox Company,” Takagi spoke.  “Eighteen are dead and forty-six wounded. Of the eight members of Noble Company, including myself, two are dead and one wounded, mortally.”

“It was a tough spot,” Park replied.  “But you held the line. And because of it, we still have the radio station.”

            The air inside the armored vehicle was hot and stale.  The dust kicked up from the road filtered in through the view slits in the armored plating, as other vehicles passed.  The haze was visible through the narrow beams of penetrating sunlight.

“I’m reorganizing the Regiment,” Park spoke.  “I want you to take temporary command of my second battalion. I’m combining what is left of Fox and Noble, with Golf Company. Leighton will take command of that unit, for the time being. I’ve relieved Captain Durand of Golf Company for his abandonment of the radio station.”

            Takagi nodded in acknowledgement.  He understood it was a temporary posting, until replacement men and officers could be sent.  It was a fantastic opportunity for Takagi, only a recent Academy graduate.  The excitement, he kept to himself.

“Thank you ma’am,” Takagi politely responded.  

“It won’t be an easy assignment,” said Park.  “But you have clearly proved yourself capable by holding the radio station. Since we were able to hold onto to the radio station, the intel boys have discovered something of interest.”

            Park opened the satchel she had slung under her shoulder and removed a folded paper.  She unfolded the paper and the size grew to that of a large map.  It was a map of the old Mogadishu Stadium.  This was the impact site of the Zeon resupply capsule that had crash landed the day before.  It was only a few hundred meters from the Federation occupied zone.  The major laid the map on the table; covering up the others.

“You told me the other day you thought it would be advantageous to hit the Zeon,” Park began.  “This is where I think you should hit them.”

            Takagi examined the map.  In actuality, the map was a large printed aerial photograph taken by an unmanned reconnaissance drone of the crashed capsule and the surrounding area.  A cartographer made the effort to label the streets and buildings.  In his head, Takagi began to formulate tactical approaches to the capsule; ways that provided the best cover and the best line of retreat, should the need arise.

“Turns out, the Zeon fucked this one up,” Park said, though cursing was uncustomary.  “The capsule undershot its intended landing zone by a good twenty, thirty kilometers. Someone there must not have gotten the entry math precise enough. Long story short, it was off course and slammed down right in the middle of town.”

“These are the type which transports Zakus?” Takagi asked. 

“Correct. We know they’re supply has been drained. There could be maybe three or four on board. And we’ve caught another break.”

“How so?”

“When the capsule impacted, it was at an angle. It landed on the side with the ramp, meaning the Zeon cannot get it open.”

“Are you serious?”

            It was a stunning revelation.  The enemy’s resupply hampered by the fact that they could not get the door to their own capsule opened.  The capsule’s pilot had been given inaccurate entry coordinates.  As a result, he undershot the intended landing site to the north of Mogadishu and landed in the city itself.  The descent angle was too steep and the pilot had to fire the retro rockets at full power to prevent from disintegrating upon landing.  While the capsule landed mostly intact, it was at an angle with the capsule’s door facing toward the ground.  Personnel could escape through a small crew hatch, but the ramp for the heavy equipment could not be opened.

“We’ve picked up additional chatter,” Park continued.  “Zeon engineers are bringing heavy cranes to try and upright the capsule. Our UAVs have confirmed movement of engineering equipment to the front. So, command wants us to deprive the enemy of their resupply.”

“…And what would that entail,” Takagi asked with enthusiasm.

“You volunteered the idea. The entire Division will be massed to attack the Zeon capsule. I want you leading the charge, so to speak. Your Battalion will be tasked with capturing and subsequently destroying the capsule.”

“I am honored Major, but this seems like the Air Force’s jurisdiction.”

“Negative. The Zeon have moved up significant numbers of anti-air assets into the area. They aren’t making it easy for us to drop a bomb on it.”

            An idea struck Takagi.  This could perhaps be an opportunity to change the fortune of the beleaguered 5th Army.

“Suppose we capture and hold the capsule,” Takagi spoke.  “We help ourselves to the Zaku units onboard. We pilot them out of there and then redeploy them as our own!”

“It is a bold plan, but…” Park responded with a long pause.  “The mobile suits are extremely complex machines. Do you know someone who could pilot one?”

            It took Takagi a moment to think.  He did not like the answer to the question.  Leighton was that answer.  Lieutenant Leighton was ruthless, savage, and unpredictable.  He was an engineer by trade and had spent an extensive amount of time studying the systems of a downed Zaku on his own initiative.  All things considered, he was the best choice, though not one Takagi would like to make.

“Lieutenant Leighton, I believe, knows how to pilot one,” Takagi’s words sounded hesitant.

“Leighton…” Park said, with spite in her voice.  “The man is a monster. I have severe reservations about trusting him with the command of the combined companies and you want to trust him with a Zaku? He was the reason why you were brought in.”

“I don’t like it either. If we want to win this war, we need mobile suits. Leighton understands more than anyone else in the 5th Army.”

            A moment of silence passed between the Major and the Captain.  It was as quiet as one could get in the middle of a warzone.  Park contemplated heavily on the idea.  It was true what Takagi said.  If the Federation wanted a fighting chance, it needed mobile suits.  It was also true that Leighton’s extracurricular study of the downed Zaku provided him wealth of knowledge on their workings.  It was to the point that he could possibly pilot one.  Park had also heard the rumors.  Word had spread that Leighton had executed a group of Zeon prisoners.  Though, no physical evidence linked him directly to the atrocity, the court of public opinion had passed its verdict.  After tense moments of contemplation, Park made her decision.

“If you can secure a Zaku, do it,” said Park.  “If Leighton can somehow get it working and can get it to walk, I’ll tell command to give him a clear avenue to the airport. I will not allow the attack, however, to be held up while he tinkers with one of those things. He needs to get in and haul ass, or else he’s going up in smoke with the rest of the capsule.”

            Takagi felt uneasy.  It was a feeling equivalent to one who has made a deal with the devil.  Park stared straight into the eyes of Takagi.  It was a look of dire warning.

“You keep an eye on him, Takagi,” Park spoke somberly.  “He may hate the Zeon for what they’ve done to him, but at the end of the day, he is still one of them.”

**000**

Horatio Leighton pressed a hand to the concrete wall in order to support himself and remain upright.  He started to cough several times and then he was able to throw up.  His head spun after he had lifted it way from the fumes of his vomit.  It was only the early afternoon and he was already drunk.  Several moments had transpired before the Lieutenant had to lean forward and vomit for a second time.

“Zeon fucks!” Leighton screamed, as he tiled his head back.

            The rage boiled inside of Leighton, as he fought to maintain his balance.  Today he was angry and spoiling for a fight.  There was an abandoned café nearby with its façade removed by a bomb.  Leighton stumbled inside and found a seat in a torn up vinyl booth.  He removed his helmet and looked inside.  In the helmet’s interior, among the straps, Leighton secured his photograph of the wife and son he had lost.  The sight of his family, and affect of the alcohol, sent him deeper into an unstable condition.  It had been an hour since he had finished the last of his whiskey.  The thought of sobriety was unwelcoming.

            All of a sudden, his ears were ringing.  Leighton felt himself tossed through the air; colliding with the musty pastry display at the counter.  He shattered the glass of the display with his landing.  It took a few moments to orient to the situation.  Even drunk, there was no mistaking the aerial rumble.

            The Zeon Dopp fighter’s engine was unmistakable.  It had the sound of a high pitched mechanical screech, as it raced across the sky.  The Dopp’s engine was designed by spacefarers for a space environment.  The deployment to an atmospheric combat theatre showcased the design drawbacks of the Dopp.

            There was a large crater in the street in front of the café.  Bits of debris burned while a Dopp raced overhead.  A second Dopp fired its rockets at the building opposite the café.  The rockets hit their mark and a section of the building’s façade was obliterated.     

            Leighton stumbled to his feet.  This was an inopportune moment to be as drunk as he was now.  There were bits of glass imbedded in his left arm from the landing.  The alcohol had numbed the pain significantly.  Leighton turned and began to pluck the larger shards of glass one by one. 

The two Dopps circled around and began a second attack run.  The sound of the fighters and their attack had sent the Federation soldiers scrambling for cover.  A column of Federation jeeps and light trucks had just turned onto the street, as the attack began.  The twin Dopps opened fire with their Vulcan cannons; strafing the convoy.  The rounds fired from the Dopps tore through the vehicles.  The jeeps were shredded to bits and the personnel into smaller fragments.  The trucks were torn to pieces.  The column had been decimated.

The drunken Leighton stumbled to his feet.  He leaned forward, unbalanced, and grasped his helmet.  With one last look at the image inside, he placed it on his head.  The deafening screech was overhead.  Leighton rushed out onto the street and saw the fighters pass him.  He pulled his sidearm from its belt holster and began to fire.  Not thinking it through, Leighton emptied the pistol’s magazine futilely at the jets.     

It was not long before the Dopps had turned back toward Zeon lines.  The Zeon were becoming bolder.  Their army, besieging Mogadishu, was stretched thin, short on supplies, and desperate.  They had to force an outcome before more of their men and materials were diverted to other fronts.  The ferocious assault on the radio station the previous day and the air raids demonstrated the Zeon’s almost reckless strategy.

 The vehicles of the Federation convoy burned or lay ruined.  Leighton saw the Federal soldiers crawl out from some of the vehicles.  Many were severely wounded, a few of their number missing limbs.  They screamed in agony from their wounds.  Others pleaded for their mothers and loved ones to comfort their suffering.  Leighton felt oddly detached from their misery.  He experienced hatred toward the Zeon over empathy for his comrades.  The war had claimed another.

**000**

            Zeon engineers worked at a feverous pace.  They had rushed heavy lifting equipment and cranes to the front.  Most of the equipment was pressed into service; captured from civilian construction companies.  Throughout the night, they worked to secure cables and lines around the capsule.  The progress was hampered by the crash site.  The capsule had landed on and subsequently crushed the southern section of the city stadium.  It was imbedded in the earth at an angle that covered the main cargo door.  The ideal location to park the cranes, for them to attach their cables, was blocked by the remaining section of the stadium and the scattered debris.  On top of that, Federation ground forces harassed the work with small arms and artillery fire.

            Despite the effort of the engineers, the work was taking a lot longer than anticipated.  The Zeon commander was in an inopportune spot.  In order to reinforce the capsule crash site from Federation attack, Zeon soldiers would have to be taken from another section of the Mogadishu front line.  This would leave that section vulnerable to a Federation counterattack.  The Zeon commander simply did not have the adequate reserves to properly secure the site and hold the line.  He gambled on the fact that the Federation 5th Army was too weak and demoralized to act.

            From their lines, Federation soldiers gawked at the massive capsule.  They stood on rooftops and peered from bombed out windows, as large cranes and excavation equipment converged on the site.  “Hotel Charlie” was the name given.  It was a short note jotted down by a forward observer and passed along in a report to Federation command.  The Federation soldiers all knew what was next.  The capsule was too close to their lines to be ignored.  An attack would be ordered.  The soldiers hoped it would not be their unit called upon to participate.  

**000**

            Takagi was jolted awake.  Corporal Bukowski knelt beside him and shook the Captain’s arm.

“Sir,” Bukowski spoke.  “It’s time.”

            The Corporal looked nervous in the red lamp glow of the hover truck’s interior.  The coming attack had everyone on edge.  This was a risky operation for the Federation.  If the Zeon held the capsule, the Zakus and supplies inside could tip the battle into their favor.  This was the make or break moment for the 5th Army.

            Takagi had been going over everything.  He had barely had any sleep since the fight for the radio station.  It had only been an hour or two, but it would have to suffice.  The commanders of the Battalion’s four Companies assembled at the rear ramp to the hover truck.  In addition, there was the commander of the Tank Battalion that would support the advance.  Leighton was among their number; barely sobered up.  Takagi motioned for them to enter.  The rear section of the Type 74 Hover Truck was covered with a tarp and used to store supplies and provisions.  This particular truck had its rear section converted to a command post.  It was outfitted with makeshift map tables and communications equipment, so it could act as a command and control center.

“Our objective is Hotel Charlie,” Takagi said, as he pointed to the map.  “That is the codename for the crashed Zeon capsule. Our Regiment, along with the 4th Armored, will be the vanguard for the assault. Command is throwing the entire Division into this one.”

“This is suicide!” proclaimed Captain Soliani.  “The Zekes are dug in around that thing. We’ll be cut to shreds.”

“Shut your fucking face Soliani,” Leighton interrupted.  “Goddamn cowards like you have cost us dearly in this the war!”

            Soliani turned toward Leighton with a rage that manifested inside.  Leighton turned back and responded in kind.  The two squared off.  It appeared as if they were about to erupt into violence.

“Both of you!” Takagi shouted in a firm and commanding voice.  “Captain Soliani, Lieutenant Leighton, I will not stand for this behavior. Stow the shit because we have a job to do.”

            Another officer put his hand on Soliani’s shoulder to calm the man down.  Leighton heeded the command from Takagi and backed off.  Once he was satisfied order had been restored, Takagi continued with the briefing.

“We will advance north along the Jidka Isbartiimadda,” Takagi spoke.  “To make it easier for radio traffic, it’ll go by the codename ‘Paradise’ road. The rest of the Brigade will follow behind.  Parallel to our advance, Snyder’s Brigade will be moving up on the Jidka Janaral Daud, codename ‘Varsity’ road. The rally point is Hotel Charlie at the city stadium. Captain Cho’s tanks from the 4th Armored will advance with us. We will hold the position while the engineers plant demo-charges. Once the bombs are placed, we pull back while they blow the place to hell…any questions?”

            There was a long silence.  There were those among the group that wanted to voice their protest to the operation.  They clung to the imminent ceasefire rumor and this was a senseless waste of lives on the eve of capitulation.  Despite the reservations, the fact that the attack was going to happen sunk in.  Whether they liked it or not, they would have to fight.

“Good,” Takagi said confidently.  “Assemble your men and make final preparations. Dismissed.”

            The group snapped to attention in unison, and then began to disperse.  Leighton turned to leave, but felt a hand grab him by the arm.

“A word Lieutenant,” said Takagi.

            Leighton felt he was about to be lectured.  It was something that he started to dread.  He did not like Takagi.  The pair had their disagreements.  Takagi disapproved of Leighton’s conduct while Leighton found Takagi too sanctimonious. 

“Command seems to think there are Zakus on board that capsule,” Takagi started.  “If we were to secure the site long enough, do you think you could get one moving to make it back to the airport?”

            It only took a fraction of a second for Leighton to decide.  His eyes lit up with excitement and eagerness at the suggestion.  He had wanted to pilot a mobile suit, the obsession consumed him.  All of the effort placed into the study of the one downed in the Bakaaraha Market was about to pay off.

“I can pilot the Zaku,” Leighton said, collectedly.  “So can Sergeant Tupolev. He has been going over all of the information with me. He should know enough by now to master basic movement.”

“I want this to stay between us,” said Takagi with all seriousness.  “Major Park stresses that no time considerations can be granted while you get the Zaku working. The engineers will still blow Hotel Charlie on schedule. You need to get the Zaku up and going, and get the hell out of there as fast as possible.”

“Don’t worry about that. We’ll be Oscar Mike long before then. Just make sure we don’t get shot at by friendlies.”

“The Major will see to that.”

            Leighton gave the Captain a crooked, sinister smile.  It was the kind of smile that could unnerve the most stalwart of men.  Takagi hoped he would not regret this decision.  The Lieutenant departed his Captain’s company, as a column of Type 61 tanks proceeded down the avenue.  The twin barreled Federation tanks would be supported by the infantry.

            The men of the reorganized Golf Company, under Leighton’s command, assembled around the lead tank.  The reorganization gave Leighton sixty men, nowhere near full strength.  To the south, the sounds of battle could be heard.  A feint attack had been launched on the Zeon’s right flank in order to draw enemy forces in that direction.  The rest of the Brigade fell in behind Golf Company.  The hour had arrived and the advance began.

            The lead tank made a sharp left onto Paradise Road.  Leighton and his men advanced on either side of the vehicles.  The men on foot moved quickly to match the pace of the mechanical beast.  Directly ahead was the Federation’s front line at the Jidka Sodonka.  On schedule, a flight of Federation AF-01 Mongoose twin seat ground attack jets raced overhead. 

The AF-01s buzzed in low over the buildings and toward the Zeon.  When they were on target, the AF-01s dropped their bombs and pulled back in a sharp arch.  The ordinance exploded on the Zeon frontline.  The blast lit up the pre-dawn sky in a brilliant orange hue.  The buildings once occupied by Zeon forces crumbled from the attack.  Immediately, the Zeon responded with a twinkle light display of automatic anti-aircraft cannons.  The flashes from Zeon rockets fired into the air added to the colorful spectacle.  One of the jets burst into flames and dove straight toward the ground.  The others had to adopt a sporadic flight pattern in order to avoid the fate of their comrade.  The Zeon were able to down another plane before the flight made it back to the airport.

There was justification to the costly airstrike.  The road, crossing into the Zeon occupied sector, was heavily fortified and mined.  The planes were able to take out several of the Zeon heavy gun emplacements and detonated the mine field.  The line of advance was clear.  There were a few stunned Zeon soldiers that wandered into the street in the confusion.  Leighton and his Company opened fire.

The men pressed forward.  The used the tanks for covered and fired at the enemy.  The front line had been breached, but the resistance began to mount.  Zeon, who were billeted in the surrounding buildings, woke from their beds by advancing Federation forces.  The Zeon soldiers raced to the windows that overlooked the street and began to fire.  The hail of rifle fire descended on the Federation troops below.   

A burst of elevated machine gun fire struck a private in the Company.  The man fell to the ground, as he grasped at the wound in his throat.  The blood soaked into the sand covered road.  After a few brief moments, the private was dead.  There was no time to lament.  The Federation soldiers dashed for cover.  Some pressed up against the tanks; others sought refuge in the debris from blasted out buildings.

“Left side, left side!” Corporal Bukowski cried out.  “Enemy contacts. Shit! Shit! SHIT!”

“Cut the pussy shit, Bukowski!” Leighton screamed.  “Pop smoke to mark the targets.”

            Bukowski followed the order.  Leighton once held a gun to Bukowski’s head, to steady the Corporal’s nerves.  There would no longer be any upsetting of the Lieutenant.  Mounted under the fore grip of Bukowski’s M72A1 was a grenade launcher tube.  The Corporal, in a quick motion, pulled the tube forward to open the breach.  He grabbed a smoke grenade, loaded it, and slammed the chamber shut.  The Zeon machine gun fired brazenly onto the Federation soldiers in the street below.  Two more Federal soldiers fell dead by the time Bukowski had the machine gun emplacement sighted. 

The Corporal squeezed the launcher’s trigger.  The grenade whizzed out of the launcher.  It landed right in the window where the machine gun fire originated.  The Zeon gunners watched in horror, as the grenade banged around before coming to a rest at their feet.  It suddenly burst and engulfed them in a thick haze of purple smoke.

A Federation infantryman stood at the rear of the second tank in the column.  Throughout the engagement, he trailed the tank and communicated with the crew via a phone receiver attached to a rear panel.  The man observed the smoke and called out the sighting to the tank’s gunner. 

The tank’s mechanical turret swung in response and had the position in sight.  Two loaders inside the turret placed a high explosive devastator round into each barrel.  The infantry on the street ducked, as they knew the beast was about to fire.  The two high explosive devastator rounds tore into the building.  The blast threw sections of concrete and debris all over the street.  The building, already heavily damaged from a previous battle, collapsed.    

With the building thoroughly demolished, the advance continued.  The Federation soldiers came under an increased amount of fire.  The casualties were starting to mount.  A man would be shredded by automatic weapons fire and another, disintegrated by a rocket explosion.  The advance had to temporarily halt, as a Federal soldier, only a man from the torso upward, was dragged out of the lead tank’s path.

Bukowski crept along with the advancing Federal forces.  He stayed as close as he could to the rear of the tank, shielding himself from enemy fire.  The commander of the tank sat exposed in the turret barking orders at the top of his lungs.  With a pair of binoculars in his hand, he would select targets for his gunners.  A loud shot rang out, more audible than the other small arms.  The sound came from an elevated position and could be assumed to be a large caliber shot.  The commander of the tank slumped forward, a gaping wound in the center of his chest.  A hand from an unseen body reached up and grabbed onto the lifeless commander.  The body of the commander was forcefully pulled to the safe interior of the tank.  Bukowski was horrified, as he watched the scene play out before his eyes.  To his left and right, the infantry on the streets dove for cover.  The Corporal was young, and though he had witnessed many horrors in this war, he still had trouble processing them.  Leighton grabbed Bukowski by one of the load straps on the Corporal’s flak jacket and dragged him from the street.

“The hell is wrong with you Bukowski!?” Leighton screamed, in a rhetorical fashion.

            The tank of the deceased commander rotated its turret.  The barrels elevated and the target sighted.  Two loud blasts rang out, as the shells raced toward their mark.  The windows of a corner section of the building exploded.  Debris flew out and the dust covered the area.  If the sniper had remained, there would be little left to identify.  More plausibly, they fired their shot and retreated with haste.     

Leighton and his men did battle against their fortified foe.  The tanks were firing both of their barrels wildly into buildings, mostly old apartments, to dislodge the defenders.  Other Federal infantryman equipped with shoulder mounted rockets fired at the entrenched Zeon. 

The surprise of the attack worked in the Federation’s favor.  The overconfident and overextended Zeon force had underestimated the Federation 5th Army.  It was believed the 5th Army was on the verge of collapse and another victory for the Zeon African Front was at hand.  Most of the Zeon were content to wait for the capitulation and, as a result, had become sedentary.  They would initially fire a few shots at the Federation soldiers before the seriousness of the situation was grasped.  The resistance mounted by the Zeon soldiers quickly disintegrated.  The men lacked sufficient anti-tank weapons since they relied so heavily on the Zaku’s firepower against Federation armored targets.  The cumbersome rocket launchers were cast off by the overconfident Zeon infantry.

A heavy smoke from the bombs dropped blanketed the area.  The dust thrown up by the crumbling buildings created a dense haze.  The visibility was drastically reduced.  Soldiers were covered in the fine powder from the concrete.  They looked like ghostly apparitions; traversing the avenue.  If a Federation soldier was hit, a medic was called.  There was no stopping the column to evacuate the wounded.  They would have to wait for ambulances from the rear. 

Leighton’s Company was ordered to press the attack.  They were to reach the Zeon capsule no matter the cost.  The Zeon troops were taken by surprise.  Their numbers swelled in the street, as they sought to flee from the Federation advance.  The overly successful campaign made any notion of Federation attack a figment of the imagination, but this advance was all too real.  Leighton’s men kept up an aggressive fire to their front and into the backs of the fleeing Zeon.  A few Zeon soldiers attempted to organize, but they were simply overwhelmed.  Not even the stubborn Zeon holdouts that refused to vacate the buildings could stop the advance.  Flankers branched from the Federation column to enter the buildings and eliminate the resistance.  The utilization of the flankers made it possible for Golf Company to spearhead the advance and not have to worry about the exposed flanks.

To the south of the stadium, and the wrecked capsule, was a large open area.  The open area, free of buildings, had been a large city park before the war.  The Zeon had repurposed the park as a staging area for supply depots and field hospitals.  The clearing proved advantageous for the Federation armor.  Now, they could extend from a column to a line of advance.  No longer moving single file, they attacked in a unified front.

The Federation tanks sped up to hurry their advance.  Zeon soldiers fled while doctors and nurses struggled to carry those unable to walk.  They fled so quickly, the Zeon tankers made no effort to man their vehicles.  Rather, they focused more on their own flight from the field.  The Federation tanks crushed stacks of crates under their treads.  They crashed through the Zeon tents; ripping them down and flattening any materials left inside.  The gunners kept up a furious shelling of the Zeon.  All manner of Zeon armored vehicles and support trucks went up in flames.  The creaking treads of the Federation tanks trampled the ground once occupied by the spacenoid enemy.

The Federation attack was going fairly well, much better than expected.  There had been several casualties, men hit by small arms fire.  The tanks had all remained intact.  The few Zeon light rockets fired at the tanks had either missed or bounced off a sloped armor section.  Leighton caught a glimpse of the massive Zeon capsule.  It was indeed a massive contraption, large enough to accommodate three Zaku mobile suits on a descent through the atmosphere to the Earth.  The Zeon engineers, that had worked to upright the capsule, began to scatter.  They too were taken by complete surprise at the sudden appearance of Federation soldiers.  Their retreat had been made with such haste that they abandoned the heavy lifting equipment.  Leighton and his men picked off the last remaining engineers, who were vainly attempting to salvage the equipment or too slow to evacuate.

The Federation tanks surged forward to surround the stadium and the prized downed capsule.  Other Federation infantry arrived to secure the position.  The 2nd Brigade, which advanced up Varsity Road, linked up with the 8th to strengthen the Federation’s hold.  The word was passed for the engineers to be brought up, so they could lay their charges.  The orders were to hold the position until the engineering corps could rig the Zeon capsule for demolition.  Once readied, the Federal forces would withdraw.  The capsule would be detonated and the Zeon deprived of the much needed supplies.  The feint attack launched to the southwest had diverted a bulk of the Zeon reserves, including most of their Zakus. 

The Federation also threw all available air assets into the fray.  The skies were filled with Federation fighters and ground attack planes relentlessly attacking any and every Zeon target they could find.  The Federation pilots sought out Zeon targets all over the city, attacking ones far away from the ground combat, in order to sow confusion amongst the enemy’s ranks.  The Zeon, naturally, attempted to counter the Federation air attack by launching their fighters.  Unfortunately, the inadequate Zeon Dopp fighters, though in superior numbers, fell victim to their gravitationally accustomed adversaries.

Leighton opened a personnel hatch on the side of the capsule.  He left command of Golf Company with Sergeant Khan, the acting commander of Fox Company prior to the reorganization.  The capsule’s interior had a dark and cavernous feeling.  Leighton switched on his tactical flashlight and searched for an electrical panel.  Sergeant Tupolev followed the Lieutenant inside and also switched on his light.  The two searched cautiously, for there was the danger that Zeon soldier may have sought shelter in the capsule and could act unpredictably in a panic.  Their rifles were held closely in one hand while they illuminated the area with the flashlights in the other.  After a few moments, the panel was located.

Sergeant Tupolev opened the panel up and began to flip the breakers.  Floodlights attached to the capsule’s interior structure lit up and gave Leighton his first glimpse of the prize.  Three towering Zakus glistened with their Zeon olive drab paint jobs and brand new appearance.  The sight brought much excitement to Lieutenant Leighton.  For so long he had watched the enemy decimate his comrades with these mobile suits.  Now, he had one and was ready to use the enemy’s weapon.  One of the Zakus, Leighton noticed, was damaged.  The hard impact of the capsule into the stadium had caused a bottom section to buckle.  The buckling of the capsule’s structure had, in turn, almost torn off the left leg of one of the Zakus.  The leg was barely attached; held on by a few cables.  There was no way to salvage this one for immediate use.  Leighton had to make do with the two remaining units. 

Outside of the capsule, the battle raged.  The tanks had secured a perimeter and the Federation infantry had taken up positions.  The engineers had set to work laying their charges.  The Zeon headquarters had finally realized what was happening.  Once the word reached the Zeon commander that the capsule had fallen into Federation hands, an immediate counterattack was ordered.  The area around the capsule fell silent for an hour.  The initial Federation thrust had sent the Zeon reeling.  While the enemy reorganized itself, the Federation soldiers prepared for the inevitable counterattack.  They only needed to hold the position until the engineers finished their work.  The hour lull was interrupted when a large force of Zeon HB-01B Magella Attack Tanks, supported by a mass of infantry, and one Zaku mobile suit, was spotted converging on the stadium from the north, east, and west.  The Federation line of retreat was still secured and remained opened.

Takagi had accompanied Park in a hover truck that arrived after the stadium had been secured.  He stepped out of the vehicle.  The scene was chaotic.  The system for the evacuation of the wounded had broken down.  There were several groups of wounded soldiers scattered about with maybe one or two field medics to tend to a cluster of twenty.  No ambulances were in sight.  A large collection of Zeon prisoners were having their personal effects taken from them by their Federation guards.  When a Zeon prisoner would resist the theft, they were shot dead where they stood.  Major Park was desperate to find her 1st Battalion.  The Battalion had become separated from the main column during the final assault on the stadium.  There was still no contact.

The members of Leighton’s Company loitered around the capsule’s exterior.  Less than half of the reorganized Company had made it to this point.  Some of the men had taken to looting the bodies of dead Zeon soldiers, while others lounged in the shade provided by the listing capsule.  A detachment of engineers busily set to work laying the demolition charges. 

“Where is Lieutenant Leighton!?” Takagi demanded.

“Sir, he is inside the capsule,” Bukowski responded with a pair liberated Zeon officer boots, which were his size, in his hand.

            The sight disgusted Takagi.  The looting was a dishonorable practice.  There was no doubt Leighton condoned this activity, Takagi believed, the Lieutenant may have even encouraged it.  The thought was interrupted by a shell burst.  A top section of the stadium exploded from the impact.  The blast came from a shell fired by a Magella tank.  The Zeon were close.

            The Federation tanks opened fire in retaliation.  The battle for the stadium had resumed with a massive Zeon counterattack.  The men of Golf Company scrambled to their feet.  They tried to balance securing their spoils while seeking cover.  Leighton sat in the cockpit of one Zaku while Tupolev claimed the other.  The two ran a diagnostic in each of their mobile suits to bring the systems online.  This was taking longer than expected.  Leighton removed his helmet and placed it against the console.  It was proving too cumbersome in the cramped cockpit.  He kept the radio headset on to communicate with Tupolev.

“Misha,” Leighton radioed.  “How’s yours coming?”

 _“Ah, slow going Lieutenant,”_ Tupolev responded.  _“Still loading framework is what message says.”_

“They must be in some kind of power down mode for orbital entry. Maybe we aren’t booting properly.”

_“Or maybe Zeon have failsafe to keep idiot Feddies from stealing their equipment.”_

            Leighton was hard pressed to resist a small chuckle.  There was no failsafe in place on these models.  The Zeon were confident, perhaps overconfident, that the Zaku was so complex it would be impossible for the enemy to operate one.  The time it was taking was of concern.  The pair knew they had been there for an hour and had yet to get the Zakus operational.  With the loud blast outside; it was understood time was running out. 

 _“What’s your status?”_ Takagi broke the silence over the radio.

“Damn things are in some kind of power down mode,” Leighton responded.  “It’s taking longer than expected. Zekes must’ve powered them down for the orbital drop.”

            Takagi had stepped through the door into the capsule.  He was mesmerized by the sight of mobile suits.  The dire situation brought him back to reality.  The engineers were ready with their charges.  The Zeon forces were coming up in force and were poised to overrun the position.  There was no longer a need for this indefensible salient in the Federation line.  The order was issued to begin to fall back.

 _“The engineers are ready to blow this site,”_ Takagi radioed.  _“Command has ordered the withdraw. Leave the damn Zakus, they’ll be blown to hell. We need to get out of here!”_

“Dammit!” Leighton shouted directly to Takagi, as he leaned out of the torso cockpit.  “We can get these things going. Buy us some more fucking time!”

“Command isn’t giving you any more fucking time, Lieutenant. The objective has been accomplished. We’re ready to demo the site and pull out. That includes you. You can come to your senses and leave, or I can order you out!”

“The hell with you!”

            At that last outburst, Leighton slammed a button on a side panel.  It closed the hatch to the Zaku’s torso cockpit and isolated Leighton from Takagi.  The Captain was enraged.  He glared at Sergeant Tupolev, who was stunned by the act. 

“I am sorry sir,” Tupolev replied calmly, as he closed his cockpit hatch.

            Takagi was furious.  His own subordinate had refused a direct order and encouraged another to follow suit.  If Leighton survived this, somehow, Takagi would personally file the court marshal charges.  There was little time to dwell on that, for the explosives planted by the engineers were to detonate.  The warning had been given to clear the area.  The Federation tanks had already begun to fire and fall back; the accompanying infantry doing the same.  Takagi dashed out of the capsule through the access hatch.  He made his way over to the command hover truck and climbed aboard.  Seemingly out of nowhere, the recollection of what Park said, about Leighton being a Zeon, came to mind.  He wondered what that could truly mean.

            Leighton was in a panic.  He was in a desperate race to get the Zaku started before the explosives went off.  Everything that he could think of to do, he did.  The MIL-Book computer he plugged into the Zaku’s console ran all of the operations programs he had created.  In the desperation, Leighton began to type in an old activation code line on the MIL-Book.  It was a basic startup code he used to restart colony systems while on spacewalks, such as antenna, exterior hatches, life support, etc.  The code was a long shot, but it worked. 

The Zaku’s main power came on line and the movement functions appeared to be operational.  Leighton grabbed a throttle and manipulated the controls.  The arm of the mobile suit slowly lifted and the fingers curled inward.  Tupolev watched in amazement.

“You’re going to feel like an idiot for this one,” Leighton radioed.  “Run the basic extra-municipal startup code. Like the one you use when trying to open a hatch on a colony or recalibrate something, and the system has locked you out. I did it all the time when I used to work on the colonies.”

 _“Ok I’ll try!”_ Tupolev responded.  _“Well fuck me, it worked!”_

“I feel like a fucking idiot. Damn things were designed by spacenoids, in theory, they should be running off of the same programming concepts we used up there.”

            Tupolev’s Zaku powered up to full.  Mimicking Leighton, Tupolev also manipulated the controls and began to move the machine’s limbs.  Leighton was ecstatic in the pilot’s seat; behind the controls of the mobile suit.  Ever since his Company had downed one with a rocket, he had studied every system on the Zaku to prepare for this moment.  Hardly able to contain his excitement, Leighton pressed his foot down on one of the pedals.  The Zaku Leighton piloted took a step forward.  The capsule’s interior did not permit much movement.  The next goal was to get outside.

            The Federation tanks began the withdrawal.  The ones on the perimeter fell back to a rally point at the stadium itself.  The Zeon were approaching in force.  The Magella tanks fired rounds into the Federation positions.  The Federation infantry moved back with the Type 61s, each relying on the other for support.  When the capsule initially landed, a force of Zeon engineers arrived with heavy lift equipment.  The cranes brought in were able to upright the capsule, but there was still a considerable amount of debris that blocked the main loading ramp from opening.  The Federation forces captured the site before the Zeon engineers could finish their work.

            Time was about to run out for Leighton and Tupolev.  The final evacuation order had been issued.  The engineers would detonate their charges the instant the last Federation tanks cleared the blast zone.  There would be no waiting for the men left inside.  Leighton was confident enough to pilot the Zaku, thanks to all of the simulations he constructed in his engineering program.  He knew which controls operated which systems.  The Zaku took an unbalanced step toward the ramp.  Leighton pulled the Zaku’s right shoulder back and then slammed it into the capsule’s side.

            The Zeon were closing in.  The Magella tanks could be seen lumbering down the avenues, some even exchanged direct fire with Federation tanks.  The twin barreled Federation Type 61s could outgun their Zeon counterparts and possessed superior armor.  The Zeon Magella were lighter, faster, more maneuverable, and more numerous.  Two rounds fired from a Type 61 whizzed down the avenue and blew apart a Magella.  It seemed every time one Magella went up in flames, three more raced forward from out of the smoke.  The tank war, however, was fast becoming obsolete.  A lone Zeon Zaku dashed forward in the direction of the stadium.  There was little the Federation tanks could do to stop it. 

The Zaku blasted apart four Federation tanks and then proceeded to the stadium.  The Zeon mobile suit scaled the northern face of the stadium and perched itself in the low cost bleachers.  The Federation soldiers on the field, around the capsule, fled in panic.  They would not stand their ground against it.  The Zaku smashed a section of seats with every step it took, as it traversed toward the contestant field.  In a matter of moments, the Federation forces had vacated the area.  Orders were about to be given to destroy the capsule.  The Zaku’s glowing red eye swung back and forth, as it scanned the area.  It picked up a reading from inside the capsule.  The reading registered as a friendly in the Zaku’s system, so there was no need to respond.

The ramp to the capsule buckled.  The full might of Leighton’s Zaku pressed against the bulkhead had created an opening.  The morning sun trickled into the cavernous interior and illumined the brilliant mobile suits.  One more thrust from the Zaku’s shoulder pried the capsule’s ramp open.  Leighton manipulated the controls and brought the upper portion of his Zaku through the opening he had created.  The Zeon Zaku turned in bewilderment at the emerging mobile suit.  The enemy pilot did not know what to make of the sight. 

Leighton slammed his right controller forward.  The right arm of his Zaku thrust forward; the fingers on the hand extended.  Before there was a chance for the enemy pilot to register the hostile act, Leighton had a hold on the enemy’s Zaku.  The fingers of Leighton’s mobile suit crushed the optical sensor of the enemy unit and mangled the head component.  The enemy pilot was blind.  He frantically flipped switches, to try and reboot the optics system.  Leighton went for the kill.

The grip on the enemy’s Zaku tightened.  Leighton pulled the enemy Zaku to the ground by his hold on the face.  The enemy Zaku slammed into the ground.  The pilot was unable to compensate due to the blindness.  Leighton acted quickly.  He planted his Zaku’s knee into the fallen enemy and knelt down over his prey.  Unsure how best to proceed, Leighton pressed the left hand into the enemy back.  With the right, Leighton began to furiously punch the enemy.  If one could see Leighton in the cockpit, they would observe a look of cruel satisfaction upon his face.

The impact of the heavy fist strikes left large impressions on the enemy Zaku.  The armored plating buckled and gave way.  The convulsive movements of the enemy soon ceased, evidence that the enemy suit had lost power.  Leighton stopped his assault.  He took a moment to survey his handiwork. 

Over Leighton’s shoulder, Tupolev’s Zaku staggered out of the capsule.  The Sergeant, not as adept a pilot, struggled to keep his mobile suit upright.  He had to constantly compensate movement to keep from falling over.  The controls were complex and Tupolev had studied them with Leighton.  Leighton, however, had been consumed with piloting a Zaku and devoted a vast amount of time learning how to pilot one, through hacked Zeon software.  Once Tupolev had caught his balance, he stood his mobile suit up straight.

 _“I think I am getting the hang of this,”_ Tupolev said over the comm link.  _“But clearly you have already mastered yours.”_

“I feel like I can take on the entire Principality,” Leighton said, boastfully.

_“No doubt you could, Lieutenant, but our orders are to return to our lines. Besides, they’re about to make this place go boom!”_

            Tupolev fed a command into his Zaku and began to climb out of the capsule.  Leighton turned his around, once Tupolev cleared the entrance, he reached back inside.  Using the Zaku’s hand, Leighton grabbed his mobile suit’s 120mm machine gun.  Tupolev emerged with his unit’s weapon in hand already. 

 _“It is a lot harder in person,”_ Tupolev said, as he fought to maintain balance.

“Switch on the upright auto stabilization function,” Leighton responded.  “It’ll have the computer correct for balance, so you can focus on other actions.”

            Leighton knew what he was talking about.  The technology was very familiar to him.  Tupolev followed the direction and opened a command prompt on his Zaku’s computer.  He quickly typed in a command for balance and watched in amazement, as the mobile suit took over that function.

 _“That worked!”_ Tupolev exclaimed.  _“Now, we really should be getting out of here bef…”_

            A large explosion rocked the capsule.  The entire craft was destroyed by explosives of the Federation engineers.  The blast wave unbalanced Leighton’s Zaku and violently shook Tupolev’s.  The entire remaining southern section of the stadium was leveled.  Shrapnel from the exterior of the capsule flew out in all directions, some embedded in the Zakus.  Leighton struggled for several moments to get back on his feet.  He had not quite mastered every movement of the Zaku.  Tupolev was a bit shaken up, but his systems were still intact.

“Guess we should get going?” Leighton said.

“Agreed,” responded Tupolev.

**000**

            Takagi watched the explosion from the turret of the command hover truck.  The turret weapon had been removed to make space for this observation point.  The Type 74 was in the middle of a column of vehicles that raced south, just passing through the Federation front lines.  The Captain held the binoculars to his eyes in order to focus on the blast site.  It was hard to distinguish anything, the blast and collapsing structure threw a blinding amount of dust into the air.  He had hoped Leighton had made it out with a Zaku.  The enemy’s mobile suit in Federation hands might help their fortunes in this war.  However, it would be a mobile suit in the unpredictable and insubordinate hands of Leighton.  The notion was unsettling.

            The sand thrown up by the hover truck’s lift fans choked anyone who stayed in the turret for too long.  Takagi had succumbed and climbed back inside; shutting the hatch.  The interior was full of persons; some were commanders, who all outranked him, as well as select members of their staff, and the vehicle’s crew.  Takagi squeezed his way through the throng of bodies to a communications engineer seated at a computer terminal.

“Any signs of movement at the blast site?” Takagi asked the engineer.

“Nothing yet,” the engineer replied.  “Zekes throwing up Minovsky Particles like an underage girl at a frat party, guess their pissed about our visit. It’s disrupting the sensors, plus all that dust has killed the visibility. Those bomb guys laid enough ordinance to blow that place to hell several times over. No way anyone there, still is.”

“Thank you for your colorful input, lieutenant.”     

            Takagi shuffled over to an unoccupied corner.  By now, most of the occupants had huddled around a map on a table situated in the center of the compartment.  Their attention was focused solely on that.  Takagi slumped down onto the floor and leaned his head back against the bulkhead.  He let the thought of Leighton’s passing sink in.  It felt more like a burden lifted.

**000**

            Leighton was in a full sprint; his Zaku taking one quick step after another.  Tupolev followed closely, as the pair made their way down the Paradise Road.  They moved quickly to avoid interaction with the enemy.  The Zeon forces in this sector had been thrown into complete disarray.  They were not completely oblivious to the theft of two of their Zakus, nor were they in a position to reclaim their mobile suits.  The main objective for Leighton and Tupolev was to reach the Federation lines and deliver the prizes. 

            The pair had yet to establish communication with their own forces.  Federation channels did not work easily with Zeon communications equipment.  The primary fear was being mistaken for Zeon and met with friendly fire.  Takagi had promised Leighton that Federation forces would hold their fire if the theft was successful.  Leighton was not sure if that offer was still on the table.  He was not sure if he was expected, or had already labeled as missing in action following the blast.  Leighton stared down at the photograph he wedged into the control panel; the one of his wife and child.

“I’m almost there Ellie,” he spoke to the photo.  “I can make it.”

            A missile whizzed past the chest of Leighton’s Zaku.  The exhaust plume led to a building on his immediate left.  Leighton stopped his sprint in order to react.  His blood was up and he was angry.  The optical scanner picked up a Federation rocket team on an upper floor of a building ahead.  Leighton frantically tuned his comm equipment in an effort to broadcast on their frequency.  The one thing the Federation forces got right was their radios.  Federation transmissions were complexly encrypted and could not be intercepted or hijacked by Zeon equipment.  Therefore, Leighton’s efforts were in vain. 

            Tupolev acted quickly.  He waved the arms of his Zaku in an effort to get the rocket crew to cease fire and establish communication.  The effort was in vain, as the panicked rocket crew reloaded for another shot.  The crew observed the Zakus acting in a strange manner; not attacking, but rather motioning and standing in place. 

            Takagi opened his eyes.  A radio transmission played on a speaker at the hover truck’s terminal caught his attention.  The message was not intended for anyone in the hover truck, but it was sent over common channel.  On one end was a Federation soldier in the field screaming about coming up against two Zakus and pleading for help.  The soldier then went on to describe the Zakus’ odd behavior.  Takagi leapt to his feet and dashed to the engineer at the terminal.

“That signal!” Takagi shouted.  “Where is it coming from?”

“OP behind us several city blocks,” the engineer responded.

“My God, he’s done it!” Takagi shouted.  “Tell them to hold fire!”

“Are you serious?”

“Just trust me, lieutenant. Have one of the men shine their torch at the Zaku and flash N-O-B-L-E in Morse. If he responds with some manor of expletive, it’s Leighton.”

            The frightened Federation rocket crew commander was dumbfounded by his orders.  His crew was panicked and worked in a state of terror to reload their rocket launcher.  Two Zakus standing only meters away gave cause for their agitated behavior.  The crew commander, upon hearing instructions from over the radio, nervously unhooked his flashlight from the clip on his flak jacket.  The rest of the crew watched in disbelief, as their commander approached the edge of the ruined opening of the building.  He stared the Zaku down, terror in his eyes, and signaled on his flashlight.  Several tense moments transpired, as the crew commander looked on.  A mechanical grinding broke the silence.  The blast door that covered the pilot’s seat opened.

“Jesus-fucking-Christ,” Leighton swore loudly from his cockpit seat.  “About bloody time you recognized us as friendly.”     

**000**

            The evening sun began to set and darkness crept upon the city by the sea.  The waves crashed on the sandy shore and against the breakwater that protected the main runway of the Aden Adde International Airport.  The ground crews worked at a feverish pace to direct aircraft preparing to takeoff and those taxiing from landing.  A formation of Medea transports recently arrived with evacuated Federation troops from the Iraqi theatre.  As the beleaguered troops disembarked from the ramp of their transport planes, they were stunned by the sight of two Zaku’s waiting on the tarmac.

            A large contingent of onlookers turned out to inspect the captured quarry.  Leighton had navigated, with Tupolev closely behind, the Zakus onto a stretch of tarmac adjacent to an aircraft maintenance hangar.  The mobile suits flanked by an escort of Federation tanks.  The Lieutenant entered the command for the Zaku to kneel, and the mobile suit executed the function.  This allowed Leighton a more convenient exit from the mobile suit.  Now, the Lieutenant surveyed the Zaku, as throngs of Federation soldiers clamored around the mechanical beast. 

            The Federation soldiers gawked in amazement at the Zakus.  They had all witnessed the destructive capability of the Zeon’s mobile suits and had suffered defeat at its hands.  Their dread of the mobile suits turned to wonder.  Hardly any of them had been able to get this close this safely to a Zaku.  The men would approach the limbs of the Zaku and, reverently, touch a hand to the mobile suit.

            Their gaze soon shifted to Leighton and Tupolev.  To these two extraordinary figures who miraculously delivered the dreaded enemy’s weapons into the Federation camp.  Cheers erupted among the Federation troops.  Several of the men took to hoisting Leighton and Tupolev onto their shoulders.  Leighton vehemently, though futilely, resisted, as there were diagnostics he wished to run on his captured prize.  Tupolev, however, seemed to enjoy the praise.

            Takagi emerged from the command hover truck.  The scene was a jubilant one.  The morale of the men appeared transformed.  There had been little celebrating on the Federation side in the war.  The men of the 5th Army were on the verge of collapse.  Now, with the arrival of two Zakus, their spirit was lifted.  The Captain rushed over to Leighton.  He had to force himself through the euphoric mob.

“Lieutenant,” Takagi said, getting Leighton’s attention.  “You’re a fucking lunatic…But good job.”

            Leighton cracked a half smile, as the soldiers carried him off toward the still functional airport lounge.  They were intent on honoring their new Federation champion.  The military police arrived shortly after the Captain’s praise.  They were to assume control of the situation.  With efficient haste, they established a perimeter around the two Zakus; directing the revelers in another direction.  A group of MPs pulled Leighton and Tupolev down from their perch and hurried the two away.  Takagi turned to see Major Park follow the MPs.  She gave Takagi an unsettling look.  He could tell it concerned Leighton and something bad was about to happen.

**000**

            The situation seemed unbefitting to a triumphant conqueror.  Lieutenant Leighton had just delivered the Zeon’s super weapon to the Federation.  Now, he sat alone at a table in a locked room.  His handcuffed wrists rested on the table, as he stared into the mirror directly ahead.  Of course, it was evident that he was being watched from the other side of the mirror. 

Leighton was unsure how long he had been here, several hours perhaps.  The idea occurred to him to go to sleep, since whoever was responsible for this incarceration was in no hurry.  He was ready to lower his head to the table and take a nap when the door shuttered.  In rushed a clean cut, well carried female officer, from the intelligence corps.  Leighton recognized the division insignia.

“Lieutenant Horatio Leighton,” the officer began.  “I am Ensign Yo. I am here to resolve a few discrepancies concerning your background.”

“You got me,” Leighton replied with full sarcasm.  “I lied on the application. I am Level 5 certified for Spacewalks and E.V. Operations. I omitted that because I wanted to serve in the frontline infantry so badly.”

“An engineer by trade.”

“A damn good one.”

“So, what did you do before the war?”

“What’s it to you?” Leighton was becoming annoyed.

“Humor me,” Yo replied.

            The room was poorly ventilated.  A slow rotating ceiling fan provided almost no comfort.  The African heat caused sweltering conditions in the interrogation room.  Leighton had figured it was kept this way intentionally. 

“Fine,” Leighton retorted, though frustrated.  “I was a structural engineer before the war.”

“And what does that entail?” Yo asked.

“I fix shit.”

“What kind of…shit?”

“I was responsible for maintaining the structural integrity of the space colonies. To ensure none sprung a leak and explosively decompressed. So, a ton of E.V.A. work, structural tests, etc….happy?”

“Which colonies did you do engineering work for? Which Sides did you frequent most?”

            Leighton had figured out where the questioning was headed.  The intelligence officer was trying to pry details about any connection he may have with Side 3, or Zeon, as they liked to call themselves. 

“Yes,” Leighton started, with a smug undertone.  “I worked on the colonies and stations of Side 3. And yes for the record, I was born on Side 3. I grew up there, attended University there, and earned my Engineering Degree and Certification there. Is that satisfactory?”

“We were aware of your birthplace, Lieutenant,” Yo continued.  “You seemed loyal to the Federation and an enemy to Zeon, that’s good. However, there is one detail that has us concerned.”

“Let me guess, I get a Zaku started and am able to successfully pilot it to Federation lines. This, despite no formal training provided by the Federation on Zaku operation, makes my actions suspicious.”

“I think you’re on the right track. It does seem strange doesn’t it? I mean, here you are able to pilot the enemy’s super weapon back to the safety of our lines? A weapon only Zeon possess and operates. Our own mobile suit deployment is nowhere near ready, but that is not relevant, as you have no access to that program. Yet, somehow you manage to bring a Zaku here?”

“The damn thing is a machine, I am an engineer. It’s my fucking job to be good with machines. The Zakus run off of a standard Zeon operation system, the same one I majored in at University, the same one I used fixing their colonies on spacewalks. Being familiar with it means it isn’t hard to figure out how to use.”

“So, you expect the Federation and I to believe that you taught yourself how to pilot a Zaku?”

            It was clear this interrogation infuriated Leighton.  Leighton hated the Zeon, for what they had done.  He held no allegiance to Side 3, not after their atrocities.  The situation was frustrating.  He was not a spy for the Zeon, if anything; he wished to see every last Zeon dead.

“What is it you people want from me?” Leighton asked, defeated.

“We want to know the truth,” Yo responded.

“The truth…The truth is I had a family. I had a wife and an infant son, before the war. They were aboard the colony from Side 2 that the Zeon dropped on Sydney. The Zeon gassed everyone aboard before they turned the station into an orbital kinetic weapon. I was on Luna Two when it happened, contract job for the Navy. I had no way to get to them. I watched the whole thing happen on the news, helplessly, as the Zeon intentionally drove the colony into the Earth’s atmosphere. Millions dead, my Ellie and Thomas among them.”

            A silence overtook the room.  Leighton’s words had gotten to Ensign Yo.  She was young, like so many thrown into this war.  Only fresh out of training, she still retained her remnant of humanity.  It was clear she sympathized with Leighton.  She did all she could to restrain and suppress her emotions.  Abruptly, Ensign Yo stood and exited the room.  Leighton sat in silence.  He thought about his wife and his son.  Both were casualties in this cruel war.  The exhaustion of the confession overtook Leighton.  He laid his head down on the table and went to sleep.     

**000**


	3. Resilient Ridge

Resilient Ridge

 

**Side Two:**

**Lagrangian Point 4, Earth Orbit**

**3 January 0079UC:**

A contingent of Zeon infantry walked brazenly and unopposed through the colony’s control center.  They had strict orders to capture it before the Side 2 Colonization Administration was able to raise the alarm.  Many technicians and administrative personnel gasped for air and fell to the floor around them.  Dressed in protective suits, the Zeon infantry were immune to the poison gas being pumped into the control center.  The soldiers reached the doors to the control center and forced them open.  They had to secure the center in order to open the airlocks and allow reinforcements to board.  The door was forced open and inside, the Zeon discovered one last dying technician at his post.  With his final effort before death, the technician brought a fist down onto a large red button on his control panel. 

The alarm claxons blared the most awful and recognizable warning.  Every colonist aboard a space colony knew this sound from the earliest age.  It signaled a breach in the hull.  Something did not seem right to Ellie Leighton.  She had just returned to the family home from a grocery outing with her infant son, Thomas.  The tranquil street scene in front of the apartment building had come to a halt.

            Those on the street looked around in bewilderment.  A hull breach meant the air should be rushing from the pressurized habitation zone into the vacuum of space.  The air was oddly still in the massive cylindrical interior of the O’Neill colony.  Ellie still was not taking any chances.  Her husband, Horatio, was an engineer and worked on maintaining stations throughout the colonies.  He had warned about the effects of depressurization and the urgency to get into a spacesuit should that alarm ever be sounded.  She heeded his warning and grabbed her own lifesuit from the family closet, as well as the infant pressurized rescue bag.  It would have been more comforting if he were here with them, instead of on another engineering job.

            To the comfort of those on the street, a convoy of military vehicles approached at a high rate of speed.  The people believed them part of the station’s militia.  No verbal commands were given about the blaring claxons and no effects of depressurization were felt, so many on the street assumed it was a false alarm.  Some did heed the warning and sought out the nearest air tight shelter or pressurized suit lockers, but the majority disregarded the call.  The convoy of vehicles came closer.

            These jeeps were not like the ones driven by the Federation militia.  The symbols painted on the olive drab vehicles had the appearance of a barbed flower; the symbol of the seditious colonists from Side 3, who called themselves the Principality of Zeon.  The convoy of several jeeps and large cargo transports came to a halt in the middle of the street.

            The soldiers of the convoy began to disperse.  They were all dressed in pressurized suits, with rifles at the ready.  The soldiers around the cargo transports pulled the canvas roofs off the rear sections.  In each of the cargo transports were large filtration devices with several large gas canisters attached by hoses.  The order was given by the Zeon commanding officer by a wave of the arm.

            Citizens had gathered around the perimeter, established by the soldiers, to gawk at the military vehicles and their cargo.  Within seconds, citizens were falling to the ground, desperately gasping for breath.  The devices in the cargo transports were dispersal units for the Zeon’s deadly G3 poison gas.  All around, the unshielded and curious spectators were convulsing, as the gas worked quickly.  It only took a matter of seconds for the poison to take effect and death to shortly follow. 

            Those who had made it into the pressurized lifesuits were safe from the gas.  A few had gathered to see the commotion caused by the vehicles.  Now, they turned and tried to escape.  The Zeon troops raised their weapons and opened fire.  One by one, they brought down those who attempted to flee.  Another order was given by the Zeon commander.  He ordered his men to begin a building by building sweep for survivors.

            Ellie had watched the entire scene unfold from the window of the Leighton apartment.  She watched in horror while the innocent people were gassed by the soldiers.  The gas had not affected her or Thomas, as they both heeded the warning and dressed in pressurized suits.  In an act of desperation, she had tried to call her husband on the subspace phone, but the connection was offline.  Before Ellie could react further to the atrocities, the door to the apartment was flung open.  In the doorway was a Zeon soldier, obscured by the reflective glass of his pressure helmet.  Ellie stared back at the man, with young Thomas cradled in her arms.  The Zeon soldier raised his weapon at the mother and child.

**000**

**Federation Controlled Zone:**

**Mogadishu, Earth**

**Late April 0079UC:**        

Lieutenant Leighton was finding sleep impossible.  Since his capture of the enemy’s Zaku, he had hoped to be assigned to piloting the mobile suit against the Zeon.  Instead, he found himself detained, interrogated, accused of being an enemy agent, and held aboard a Federation surface naval ship, anchored off of the Port of Mogadishu. 

The ship was an antiquated and long obsolete naval cruiser, pressed into service since the Federation needed everything and anything to fight the Zeon.  Leighton guessed the ship had begun its service before the Universal Century.   He was being held somewhere below deck in the interior of the steel beast.  The room was hot and poorly ventilated; the faulty climate control system was beyond salvageable.  There were bunks, stacked six high, in orderly rows and occupied by others guilty of some infraction against the Federation Uniform Code of Justice.  Most were there for desertion.

The room, or rather the makeshift brig, was stifling from a number of elements; poor ventilation and the climate.  The conditions were intolerable and Leighton stared at the ceiling only a few inches away from his spot in the top bunk.  He was frustrated by his predicament.  He wanted to be out on the front, fighting the Zeon, and making them pay for what they have done.  Rather, he found himself held here and regarded as a traitor.  No formal charges were ever filed against Leighton, at least not to his knowledge.  He would have known if any were.

The confinement meant no access to any alcohol.  Leighton turned to drinking heavily, as a manner of dealing with the deaths of his wife and son.  Now, he found himself shuttering and in need of a drink.  It did not help his situation since he had a photograph of Ellie and Thomas in his hand.  It was the most recent, and last, photograph of them he had.   He took the picture while the family was aboard a starliner returning to Side 2, from a November holiday trip.  Leighton flashed to the trip.  They had missed their initial flight from Earth to Side 2.  After hours waiting at the airport, they finally caught a ride home.

The memory only angered Leighton.  The rage burned inside of him and he was overcome by their loss.  He recalled the agony of being trapped on Luna II, the day the Zeon attacked the colony his wife and child were aboard.  For an entire week, he watched reports on the news channels of Zeon chemical attacks; unable to do anything because of the Federation imposed “no fly” ordinance. 

His body shook almost violently, from a combination of withdraw and wrath.  He leapt out of the top bunk and began to pace about the room.  It was the middle of the night and his commotion upset the other detainees.  Leighton felt like his skin was crawling and his body on fire.  In an act of desperation, he tore off his uniform shirt and began to claw at his arms.  He scratched his arms viciously and dropped to the floor in the corner of the brig.  There, he rocked back and forth, as he sweated profusely.  After several moments, Leighton blacked out and slumped to the floor.    

**000**

“I was just handed an ultimatum by the Zeon Commander,” General Frederickson, commander of the Federation 5th Army spoke.  “It calls for the immediate return of the Zaku units our forces ‘liberated’ from the enemy. The Zeon Commander claims our usage of the Zakus directly violates the Antarctic Treaty. Claiming, since the mobile suits are an extension of the soldier operating them, it is no different than our own men wearing the uniform of the enemy. They think the Zaku a uniform…”

            The room erupted in laughter.  It was the command briefing room, a requisitioned conference room at the Mogadishu Airport Hilton Hotel.  The corps and brigade commanders were all in attendance, along with their staff officers and adjutants.  Captain Takagi felt out of place in this menagerie of the top brass, yet eager.  He found himself invited, since it was his unit that captured the Zakus.  Sergeant Tupolev was also in attendance because of his heroic act of piloting the Zaku through enemy lines.  No word was mentioned about Leighton’s involvement, and that was kept from General Frederickson.

“I sent the Zeon Commander the following reply…” the General began.  “ _To hell with you!_ ”

                 The commanders seated around the large conference table banged the surface with their fists in jubilation.  They all cheered the defiant act and the General’s crass retort.

“The order has been given sir,” the Colonel from the Support Division interjected.  “My men are repainting the Zakus in Federal livery. That way there will be no confusion amongst the enemy as to who is shooting at them!”

“Thank you Colonel, I am sure the Zeon will appreciate the clarification,” replied the General.  “Now, I believe it appropriate we recognize the heroes of the hour. Where are Captain Takagi and Sergeant Tupolev!? These are the brave men who risked everything to bring us these weapons!”

            Takagi was caught off guard by the sudden attention.  All of the eyes in the room were upon him, as his peers pressured him to stand and be recognized.  Takagi did, indeed, stand and nod to the men in the room.  He felt embarrassed by the situation.  Surely, the General had been properly briefed about Takagi’s involvement.  How Takagi actually did not capture the Zaku. 

Tupolev took a stand with Takagi.  The whole time the Sergeant gave his Captain a look of disapproval.  He suspected Takagi had something to do with Leighton’s disappearance.  Tupolev had been taken in for similar questioning when he and Leighton returned to the Federation lines with the Zakus.  Most of the questions that were asked of Tupolev concerned Leighton.  Tupolev was released because he was born on Earth and deemed loyal. 

“The Lieutenant should be here,” Tupolev muttered under his breath.

            Takagi ignored him, though unsettled by the suspicious and intimidating Sergeant.  Once the applause had ended, the room settled in for the General’s briefing.  An orderly dimmed the lights, while another activated a projector.  On the large wall, to their front, was a map of Northern Africa.  The map was color coded, indicating the lines of the Federation and Zeon forces.  In West Africa, toward Algeria and Morocco, was a large red arrow pointing toward the sea.

“The Zeon African Front is staging a massive push on our forces in West Africa,” the General spoke.  “Their intention, intelligence has determined, is to drive west into Morocco, while their Western European Front pushes south through Spain. We believe they seek to link up and effectively cutoff the Mediterranean. But, advantageous to us, this requires a massive amount of the enemy’s resources be diverted from our sector to support the advance. We are facing an enemy that has over extended its supplies and has stretched itself too thin. This is the opportunity we have been waiting for. No more talk of capitulation; we will launch a counter offensive here.”

            The commanders in the room listened to their General’s words with increased anxiety.  They were unsure if the Army could support the proposed counter attack.  They were barely holding on, with their backs to the sea and supplies running shorter every day.

“I know our predicament,” the General continues.  “I can see it in your faces. We have our backs to the wall, we’re on the ropes, and one more good hit and we’re down for the count. The Zeon know this and we wait for that final blow. But, I pose this question to you, where is that final blow? We have over stayed our welcome here. We should have been driven into the sea, but yet here we are. They lack the strength for that final blow, so they are content to wait us out. That incursion against their supply pod showed us how vulnerable they are. They have grown sedentary. They believe us weak and defeated. We hit them now and they will not be able to stop us.”

            The General motioned to his orderly and the image displayed by the projector changed.  A slide read, “Operation Resilient Ridge”.  It then switched to a diagram of Mogadishu with the Federation and Zeon positions clearly detailed.  However, this map featured the Federation lines of advance and where units would surge toward the enemy positions.  The proposal had Takagi’s full attention.  He had made similar proposals to his superiors about attacking the enemy now, when they least expected it.  Perhaps, one of them heard the proposal and it made its way to the idealistic General.

“Captain Takagi!” the General shifted all of the attention in the room.  “We will commit our new Zakus to this fight and I extend to you the honor of leading our vanguard!”

**000**

“I don’t know the first thing about piloting a Zaku,” said Takagi, as he downed a shot and signaled for another.

            Major Park joined the Captain in the Hilton’s bar, turned officer’s lounge.  Takagi was in an almost panic.  He was honored, almost thrilled, to be selected as the General’s vanguard, but terrified at the same time.  The General wanted Takagi to pilot the Zaku, along with Tupolev, and lead the 5th Army in its counterattack.  The briefing continued with detailed explanations of the attacks.  A few officers tried to persuade the General to hold off in deploying the Zakus until they could be studied, but Frederickson would not listen.  He wanted the Zakus at the forefront, leading the charge.

            The information, Takagi suspected, did not reach Frederickson about the raid to capture the Zakus.  It seemed the General believed, or was led to believe, Takagi commanded the assault and personally piloted one of the Zakus back to Federation lines.

“Don’t worry,” Major Park spoke, as she sat down next to Takagi.  “Tupolev is training one of the more adept Guntank commanders to pilot the Zaku. The General will be informed of your involvement of the capture that will save face and still win you recognition, or something.”

            The bartender refilled Takagi’s glass and poured one for the Major.  The pair took a drink.  Takagi felt a bit better about the situation.

“I hate to admit it,” Takagi started.  “Tupolev is familiar with the Zaku, but he is not the expert. You saw how badly he fumbled just getting it here. And we’re trusting him to lead this offensive? It should be Leighton piloting the lead Zaku.”

“You’d be wise to forget that name,” Park snapped.  “After the operation, the cruiser _Anzio_ will set sail for Cape Town, with Lieutenant Leighton.  There he will be interred for the remainder of the war, or executed for espionage. If they decide to go that route.”

“You think him a spy?”

“I think him a monster. Better now, that he is out of the picture.”

“Regardless, he is the best mobile suit pilot in the 5th Army.”

“We’ll train another.”

            Major Park shifted her focus from Takagi to her drink.  The perspiration from the heat covered the glass.  The air condition unit for the hotel had broken down, like the rest of the buildings at the airport.  The Major made it clear she had heard all she would on the subject of Leighton.  Takagi stood up.  He had to escape the heat of the building and seek refuge in the breeze blown in from the sea.    

“By your leave Major,” Takagi requested and was answered by a nod from Park.

**000**

            Tupolev sat in the pilot seat of the Zaku he captured.  The mobile suit was freshly painted with a coat of Federation tan, and the military’s star and crescent ensign applied.  Already stressed to his limit, he took to digging his fingers into his shaved scalp.  The Sergeant attempted to recall everything Leighton had taught him on how to operate the mobile suit.  This seemed to come so naturally to Leighton and proved incredibly difficult to Tupolev.  On top of the stress of trying to figure out the complex machine, Tupolev was ordered to train a commander of a RTX-65 Guntank.  There was a diverse pool to pick from since all of the 5th Army’s RTX-65s had been lost.  The Guntank was the Federation’s closest weapon to the Zeon’s Zaku, and many in command believed its crews could be easily cross-trained on Zaku operation.  This was in theory.

            The inept Guntank commander who drew this assignment was Warrant Officer Fields.  Fields found the Zaku’s control completely foreign.  The RTX-65s, he knew, operated on tank treads and handled like a tracked vehicle.  The Zaku was a biped unit and far more complex.  Corporal Bukowski leaned into Tupolev’s cockpit in order to be of assistance.

“Hey Sarge,” Bukowski started.  “You sure you know what you’re doing?” 

“No fucking clue, Bukowski,” Tupolev responded.  “It’d be better if Lieutenant were here.”

“I heard the MPs talking. Word is the Lieutenant is a Zeke spy!”

“You know the Lieutenant. Do you really believe he’d be working for the Zeke?”

            Tupolev returned to his work, dismissing the Corporal’s comments.  He had wondered what had happened to Leighton.  It had been nearly a week and there had been no word from the Lieutenant.  Everyone seemed reluctant to discuss his absence and those that did told fantastic rumors about how he was a Zeon spy.  Tupolev knew what was true about Leighton’s past.  The pair had done extravehicular structural work on the colony cylinders before the war.  Tupolev had even met Ellie, on a few separate occasions.  He knew, first hand, how hard their deaths affected Leighton.

            Warrant Officer Fields was becoming frustrated.  Tupolev saw the WO slam the control consol with his fists.  There was no way they could lead the vanguard; they were still struggling with basic movements.  Tupolev lamented the fact the intelligence officers seized Leighton’s MIL-book computer.  Leighton put together a “cheat sheet” program for Zaku operation and stored it on that computer.  It would have been beneficial to Tupolev.  He had protested about piloting the Zaku; stating he was not experienced enough.  He took his protest to Takagi, then to Park, and even sought, in vain, an audience with General Frederickson.  In two days, the attack was scheduled.  Tupolev would be at the vanguard whether he was ready or not.

**000**

            Leighton found himself waking up in a bed.  This bed was far more comfortable and the room more pleasant than the dungeon-like brig he had been for the past few days.  It only took a moment or two for Leighton to realize he was still on board the ship, but in the medical bay.  He went to get up, but found his left wrist handcuffed to the side railing of the hospital bed. 

“Glad to see you’re awake,” an overworked nurse dispassionately remarked.

“How the fuck did I get here?” Leighton asked, as tried to sit up and recall the last thing he remembered.

“Alcohol withdraw?” the nurse mentioned while she jotted some unrelated notes on a clipboard.  “My deadbeat ex-husband went through the same fits. Hurts, don’t it? Not having a fix. Surprised how you can get any out here. War is hell, who am I to judge.”

“Got any paint lying around? Guess I’ll be huffing that from now on,” Leighton cynically joked.  “How long have I been here?”

“As long as it took for the sedatives to wear off, hell I don’t know, I just work here.”

            The banter was interrupted by a shrill bell and a call for general quarters.  Immediately, the nurse and other medical personnel raced to the portholes and closed the blast shutters.  The bright medical bay became darkened and full of commotion.  In the exterior hallway, Leighton could hear sailors rushing to their battle stations at a full sprint.

            The ship started to vibrate, as a mechanical roar surged through the hull.  Leighton could make out the sound of a missile being launched from one of the cruiser’s firing tubes.  The missile blasted off with tremendous force.  It could not be expected to do any precision damage, Leighton deduced.  The amount of Minovsky Particles both sides dispersed in the city made any form of guidance lock impossible.  They were too far to direct the missile by wire, as the short range rocket teams had done.  This missile would be fired blindly toward the Zeon lines, preprogrammed to crash toward the ground after a determined duration and distance.

“What the hell is going on out there!?” Leighton demanded.

“Looks like Resilient Ridge is underway,” the nurse responded.        

**000**

Sergeant Tupolev was in a position he did not want to be.  He was in the lead Zaku, with WO Field’s mobile suit and a brigade of armored vehicles stretched behind on the Varsity road.  It seemed they were ready to repeat the same operation only barely accomplished a week ago.  This time, the odds were stacked against Tupolev and the other Federation soldiers.  The forward observers watched for several days, as Zeon troops fortified their positions.  The Zeon were not going to be overwhelmed so easily again.

Overhead, the missiles from the off shore naval vessels streaked across the sky.  They were fired wildly because of targeting interference.  The Federation soldiers below hoped the missiles would land somewhere critical.  The missile barrage was joined by a large scale air assault.  The Air Force was throwing their last reserves into this fight.  The ground attack planes roared low above the buildings, as they fired their payloads into the Zeon positions.

The scene ahead looked, to Tupolev, like the ending of the world.  The buildings to his front exploded in brilliant balls of fire, as all manner of ordinances found a target.  The Federation aircraft were proving to be more difficult opponents.  At the beginning of the Battle for Mogadishu, the Zeon were able to easily lock on and shoot down the enemy planes with guided surface to air missiles.  The increased dispersal of Minovsky Particles now made that impossible. 

Zeon troops with turrets of Vulcan cannons attempted to manually target the aircraft.  The sky was quickly filled with deadly trails of lead fired at six thousand rounds per minute.  With enough emplacements, the Zeon were able to effect enough aerial obstructions to force the Federation pilots to increase altitude.  When the slower Federation ground attack planes climbed higher, they were met immediately by squadrons of Zeon Dopp fighters.  The aerial carnage intensified, as the Dopp fighters preyed upon the ground attack planes, only to be engaged by the Federation’s own FF-3 Saberfish fighters.

The afternoon sky of Mogadishu lit up with a deadly aerial dance.  Planes were torn apart by cannon fire; their debris falling precariously back toward earth.  The burning hulks of aircraft plunged into the surrounding buildings.  Some exploded, while others simply burned.  A slow moving Federation AF-01Mongoose would be blasted in half by the superior firepower of a Zeon Dopp, which, in turn, would be destroyed by a faster and more atmospheric adept Federation FF-3.       

  The air strikes and missile barrages continued for two hours. The Sergeant checked his watch.  The digits instantly changed to read 08:00, the predetermined hour of the attack.  At that moment, the order was given for every Federation unit along the front line to move.  Tupolev powered up his Zaku and began the advance.  The second Zaku, with the tanks and infantry, followed quickly behind.

Tupolev charged up the Varsity road.  The lumbering steps of the Zaku shook the ground, as the mechanical behemoth sprinted at a high rate of speed.  After a few city blocks, Tupolev was into Zeon territory.  Directly ahead was an entrenched Zeon 88mm gun emplacement, in the middle of the intersection.  The Sergeant frantically tried to manually target the enemy.  He pulled the trigger on his throttle, which sent the command for the Zaku to do the same with its 120mm machine gun.      

The Zaku’s weapon fired wildly.  The bullets following the up and down motion the Zaku made, as it leaned forward and back while sprinting.  The stability control! Tupolev searched frantically for it.  It would allow servos on the Zaku to maintain a stabilized weapon fix despite the pitching caused by movement.  He searched in vain, but could not find it.  The only option was to stop.

Tupolev brought the Zaku to a halt.  Now, he was able to align his weapon and target the emplaced Zeon gun.  However, this made Tupolev a stationary target.  Every Zeon with a handheld rocket launcher rushed to a window on a building that overlooked the street and the Federation Zaku.  White trails of smoke were followed by blasts that impacted Tupolev’s Zaku.  The launchers were only rocket propelled grenades, their warheads not enough to seriously damage the Zaku.  They did succeed in distracting Tupolev.

The Sergeant shifted his focus toward the source of the blasts.  Tupolev fired wildly into the buildings.  The Zeon were so numerous and dispersed throughout the buildings it was impossible to get a solid fix.  The disruption did give the Zeon gun crew enough time to line up a shot at the stationary Zaku.  The 88mm gun fired and the round hit its target.  The screen in Tupolev’s cockpit went dark.  The shell tore through the optical unit in the Zaku’s head. 

Now he was in trouble.  There was an emergency backup camera on the breastplate for just this situation, but Tupolev forgot how to engage it.  The Sergeant began to panic.  He engaged the drive unit on the Zaku and took off in a sprint.  Running blind, Tupolev’s Zaku collided with the building to its immediate right.  The mobile suit slumped forward, as it fell to the ground with the collapsing building.  The power began to short and the control panels flickered.  Tupolev’s Zaku was effectively, out of action.

Fields had followed closely behind Tupolev.  After Tupolev’s Zaku collided with the building, Fields set up to target the gun emplacement.  Following what commands he remembered, Fields brought his Zaku to a kneeling position.  The Zeon troops looked on in bewilderment at the odd actions preformed by one of their Zakus painted in Federation livery.  Fields raised his Zaku’s 120mm machine gun.  The gun crew of the 88mm cannon worked feverishly to load another round.  Ready to fire and with the gun emplacement sighted, Fields pulled the trigger on his throttle.  Nothing happened.  Frustrated, the Warrant Officer tried to determine the reason behind the weapon’s malfunction.  No warning indicating a jam was displayed, and the weapon was loaded properly. 

After a few tense moments of searching, Fields determined the problem.  The safety on the weapon was engaged.  It would not fire until disengaged.  Fields now shifted his search for the disengage switch.  He did not recall ever going over this with Tupolev.  Fields was thoroughly distracted and oblivious to what was going on outside.

The crew of the Zeon 88mm decided to abandon their position at the impending obliteration by the Zaku.  Unbeknownst to them was Fields’ weapons safety issue.  Surging past the kneeling limbs of the Zaku were the armored tanks and infantry of the brigade.  They were ordered to press forward despite the technical difficulties of the mobile suits.  The tanks turned, as they navigated around the Zaku.  The infantry sprinted past with apprehension.  They were unnerved by the easy loss of the two and only mobile suits their side possessed.

Tupolev was face down in the cockpit of Zaku.  His restraint belt kept him in his seat.  The Sergeant hit the hatch release, but nothing.  The door was blocked by debris and would not open.  A single dim emergency light flickered and provided a modest illumination.  Tupolev had to figure a way out.  The Zaku was not responding and he was not sure how to execute a full power reboot, more uncertain if that would even work.  

The Sergeant unclipped the belt buckle and controlled his downward fall onto the control panel.  He turned himself onto his back and reached for the release handle behind the pilot seat.  After an uncomfortable search, he found the handle and pulled it toward him.  The seat became unlatched and swung forward on a hinge.  This exposed a rear escape hatch that opened onto the Zaku’s back.  Tupolev turned the grip on the hatch and it flung open.  With his might, Tupolev pulled himself through the hatch and stood on the back of his now ruined Zaku.

**000**

Captain Takagi advanced with the remnant of the 2nd Battalion up the Varsity Road.  Major Park made sure Takagi retained command after it was decided he would not actually pilot one of the Zakus.  For the first time, in what seemed an eternity, Takagi and the men under his command were not in the first wave.  They were part of the reserves, brought up to continue the attack, as the captured territory was secured.  Takagi marched on foot with his men.  He wanted to be with them in this fight, and not sheltered in a hover truck.

            The Battalion marched into the intersection where the great demonstration of the captured Zakus had faltered.  Fields had managed to accidently power down his unit.  The Zaku remained in a crouched position with its weapon trained.  The joints had all locked up and Fields could not get it to respond.  Next to that, in the crushed building, lay Tupolev’s ruined Zaku. 

            The Sergeant stood on the back of the mobile suit and waved to Takagi the moment he recognized the Captain.  Takagi stopped while his men continued forward.  Tupolev climbed down from his Zaku and traversed the debris.  He looked enraged.

“This is fucking disaster!” Tupolev exclaimed, clearly speaking with emotion.  “I told them I did not know what I was doing, but did they listen? No! Now, we are down only Zakus we had!”

“Is there any way yours can get started?” Takagi asked, hopefully.  “What about Fields’? Is there anything you can do?”

“Mine is totaled, done, gone, dead. Fuckhead Fields has managed to get himself locked out and now his unit is shutdown.”

            There was a tense pause between the two.  The frustration that had built up inside of Tupolev was starting to lash out.  He was on the verge of insubordination.  Takagi knew he had better get control of the situation.  However, Tupolev was proving difficult.

“Lieutenant Leighton should be here!” Tupolev snapped.  “You know where they’ve taken him, but yet you say nothing.”

            There was a misconception in Tupolev’s words, but he did not know it.  Takagi was equally oblivious to Leighton’s whereabouts, as the Sergeant.  The one thing in this situation that could not be tolerated was Tupolev’s insubordinate behavior.

“Sergeant Tupolev!” Takagi shouted in a commanding voice that snapped Tupolev to attention.  “It is not your duty to speculate on matters outside of our control. You were put in charge of this operation and any factors up to this point are irrelevant. Now answer my fucking question! Can these Zakus be made operational?”

“No sir,” Tupolev responded, dutifully, but with contempt.

“Why not, Sergeant?”

“Because I lack the knowledge, sir. Now, if you will excuse me?”

            Takagi nodded in affirmation and Tupolev stormed off toward Fields’ Zaku. 

**000**

            The fighting raged across the City of Mogadishu all throughout the morning.  The Federation forces surged forward from their lines and advanced along the city streets.  This attack was proving not to be the easy victory.  Only a few days ago, the Federation forces launched a successful raid that overwhelmed the Zeon and allowed them to destroy an enemy resupply capsule.  The lynchpin of Operation Resilient Ridge was to capitalize on the former success against an over confident enemy.   

            The Zeon were ready this time.  They were not going to repeat the same mistake twice.  In the days following the raid, the Zeon fortified their positions.  The infantry constructed roadblocks that would force advancing enemy armor off of the main roads and into smaller side streets designated as kill zones.  The Zeon were able to accomplish this feat, despite the logistical resupply issues and the diversion of their forces to other fronts.  With a diminished force, the Zeon would have to rely on their resourcefulness and guile in order to withstand a Federation attack.

            Throughout the city, columns of Federation tanks and armored vehicles advanced up the main avenues into the Zeon lines.  The Zeon infantry would fire from elevated positions in the buildings that lined either side of the street.  This hampered the swift advance the Federation had hoped to achieve.  The Federation commanders had anticipated the Zeon would abandon their positions, not expecting a massed attack.  They were fast being proved wrong.

            There were roadblocks constructed by the Zeon soldiers to block Federation armor.  Though crude obstacles welded together from bits of scrap metal, they were formidable enough to block passage of the tanks.  Without armored support, the infantry would be cut to pieces. 

            As a result of a roadblock, a Federation tank commander would have to seek an alternate route.  Under heavy fire already and with a roadblock ahead, the commander would order is tank to turn down the nearest alley or side street.  The commander would then have to contact the combat controllers at the Mogadishu airport.  The combat controllers were the ones responsible for navigating the Federation forces toward their objectives.  In a drawn out and time consuming process, the tank commander would be patched through to a combat controller.  He would have to give his location, to his best approximation, the situation, and list any route obstructions, and his best course of movement. 

            The combat controller would have to process the information and determine the best possible route.  This was all occurring while the Zeon were laying down heavy fire.  The Federation had numerous UAVs in the skies above Mogadishu.  The UAVs monitored the progress of the Federation advances and provided a visual overview on the streets below.  The dispersal of the Minovsky Particles was creating a lot of issues for the combat controllers.

            The Minovsky Particles interrupted the signal transmitted from the UAVs.  The interference caused a distorted picture for the combat controllers.  To compensate, technicians had to convert the UAVs from transmitting real time feeds, to static images.  The pictures relayed were sent at intervals of several minutes and on a high waveband.  This allowed for clearer images, but they had lost their live feed.  The technicians, who operated the UAVs and worked on their transmit issues, were in a different operations center on the other side of the airport from where the combat controllers were located.  Through a miscommunication, the technicians failed to mention the fact there was a signal delay from the UAVs.  The combat controllers believed the images were current and updated.

            Combat controllers would signal back to the tank commanders with the best possible detours.  The tank commanders would follow the directions only to find themselves ambushed by well entrenched Zeon forces or encountered by a dead end road.  On several occasions, tank commanders would be waiting on orders from the combat controllers on when to turn down a street.  With the delay in signal, a controller would issue the command and the tank column turn.  The tank commanders would find they had missed the turned, as the correct street was several blocks behind them.  In an exercise that served to only cause delay, the column would have to turn around and find the correct street. 

            Frustration overtook the airways.  The tank commanders and combat controllers exchanged heated remarks and insults.  It served to only tie up communications and prevent urgent signals from being heard.  The combat controllers would be accused of not paying attention and giving poor directions, while they accused the tank commanders of not following commands closely and blatantly ignoring instructions.  The confusion about the signal delay had yet to be realized.  Many tank commanders took to stopping their vehicles in areas safe from fire in order to examine street maps to determine their next course.  The situation was causing the advance to become bogged down. 

**000**

Takagi found himself crouched behind a Federation Type 61 Tank with the vehicle’s commander, Lt. Paulson.  The pair had a street map of Mogadishu.  It was a tourist map of the city, printed by a tour bus company that had all of the city’s major landmarks enlarged in caricature.  The map had been liberated from the ruined tourist kiosk across the street from their position, by Takagi.  The proper street map of Mogadishu was with the tank battalion’s commander, Major Saunders, but he and his lead tank were missing. 

“This can’t be right,” Takagi said quizzically.  “We should be east of the stadium! But yet I see it ahead to our right.”

            The demolished remnant of the stadium could be seen through a concaved roof of a building that had been blown apart.  The stadium appeared to their right.  This meant they were off course and out of position, as their line of advance should have been on the east flank of the stadium.  They were still under enemy fire at their location.  Bullets could be heard deflecting off the armored plating of the Type 61.  The tank’s turret swung around in order to bring both barrels against the Zeon point of fire.  Bukowski sheltered against the right rear side of the tank.  With his assault rifle trained on the windows of the surrounding buildings, he fired.  He could not see the enemy, he just fired in hopes it would force them to seek cover.

“There’s so much yelling on the radio,” Paulson spoke.  “I can’t get anyone at combat control to respond. All of the channels seemed to be taken up by everyone yelling at everyone else.”

            The advance was losing momentum.  It was already 13:00 and Takagi had not even reached the stadium.  By this hour, they were scheduled to be pushing through the northern outskirts of the city.  He was not sure how they reached their current position.  They had followed the commands sent by the combat controllers, but they had run into roadblock after roadblock.  Now, they were unable to reach the combat controllers on the radio and decided to stop, in order to reformulate their strategy.  Takagi figured he had seventy men in what was left of his Battalion.  Paulson had assumed overall command of the four Type 61 Tanks and the one Type 74 Hover Truck in the column. 

“I say we make for the stadium,” said Takagi.  “It was one of the objectives designated for capture. It would be a good rally point location to link up with our forces. We have a bearing on it.”

“But look ahead,” Paulson motioned, as he spoke.  “Those tanks traps won’t let us through, we can’t continue on this street.”

“Then we turn around!”

            A distressed vehicle crewman moved from tank to tank, using the vehicles for cover.  The man was distinguished by his lack of combat equipment, the tan Federation crewman jumpsuit, and the rounded tank crew helmet.  The crewman had a pistol in hand, more out of paranoia than practical defense.  Paulson turned to acknowledge the crewman.

“Sir,” the crewman spoke, as he crouched with the officers.  “Hover truck’s taken an RPG to the starboard lift fan. And some metal debris has bent the blades on the port rear fan.”

“How bad?” Paulson asked.

            The crewman could only somberly shake his head.  There was no need to ask for clarification.  Paulson already knew the seriousness of the issue.  At that moment, a rocket propelled grenade whizzed past and detonated a few meters to the left of the tank.  The explosion blasted apart the front section of a ruined café and sent two of Takagi’s men flying through the air.  A medic raced forward to aid the wounded, but there was little he could do.  One of the soldiers was killed instantly.  The other lay on his back and clenched at the intestines that protruded from his gut.  The tanks wheeled their turrets around and fired at the building where the rocket had originated.

“Hover truck is down,” Paulson said to Takagi.

“What does that mean?” Takagi demanded.

“It means the hover truck isn’t going anywhere and neither are we. The road is too narrow; we won’t be able to get around it.”

“We can’t go forward, we stay here and we’ll be torn apart, and retreat is blocked! Do you have any suggestions?”

“I do. We make a road.”

“We do what!?”

“Just follow the lead vehicle.”

            Paulson turned to the tank behind them, the second in the line.  He held a fist in the air and crossed his other below it.  This was the hand signal for the driver to start up the engine and prepare to move.  Dodging the small arms fire, Paulson climbed onto the back of his tank and dashed for the turret hatch.  He dropped down through the opening and closed the armored cover.  After a few moments, the jet turbine that drove the Type 61 roared to life.  Takagi moved to the cover of the second tank, as Paulson’s tank wheeled to the right.

            The driver pushed the throttle and the tank sped forward.  There was a small damaged one story building directly in the path of the rushing tank.  Without any regard, Paulson’s tank crashed through it in a brazen move.  The small building, already blasted to pieces from the battle, collapsed onto the armored beast.  The tank did not stop there, rather it kept going.  Following Paulson’s strategy, Takagi ordered his men to follow.  They charged through the ruins of small the building.  The other tanks followed.  The hover truck was abandoned and its crew joined the infantry.

            The lead tank found itself on a wide open avenue.  The avenue traveled east and the stadium was visible several blocks ahead.  They were not met with any resistance and the infantry soon caught up with Paulson’s tank.  The reckless gamble had paid off.  The convoy headed toward the stadium. 

**000**

            The command center in the airport Hilton was a scene of pandemonium.  The room was deafened by the shouts of the commanders to their subordinates over the phones.  They would then turn to the combat controllers and scream at them for leading their vehicles off course.  The situation was rapidly deteriorating for the Federation.  Units all over the city were pinned down in Zeon kill zones, or lost because of a confusing series of detours.  The issue with the UAV delays had been figured out, but only after several hours.  The combat controllers adjusted accordingly for these factors.  A new problem plagued the slow moving UAVs.  The Zeon soldiers started shooting them down.  With fewer UAVs in the sky, it was taking longer to get data for the combat controllers.

            The casualties were starting to mount for the Federation.  An unending line of ambulances made its way back to the terminal from the front.  The doctors and medics were completely overwhelmed by the surge of wounded.  Those who were in the worst shape were stabilized and immediately loaded onto Medea transport planes, to be flown to the Federation hospital in Mombasa.  This barely helped to alleviate the workload on the doctors. 

            General Frederickson was oddly calm, as the situation fell apart around him.  He seemed distracted.  In his hand was a report on the Zakus.  So much of his plans depended on the Zakus that had been captured.  They proved to be complete failures.

“Tell me Captain,” Frederickson addressed an adjutant.  “What of our Zakus?”

“Sir!” the Captain replied.  “One Zaku severely damaged and feared lost. The other is inoperable.”

“And what of the pilots?”

“Warrant Officer Fields was seriously wounded in the head by a sniper round. He is in an ambulance on its way to the field hospital now. They believe it is mortal. Sergeant Tupolev was last reported still working on the inoperable Zaku.”  

            The General clasped his hands together behind his back and slowly began to pace about.  The hotel ballroom, where the command center was established, had an elevated stage.  It was on that stage where the General had his station established and his orderlies situated.  The ballroom had every table and surface covered with computers and other monitoring equipment.  Manning them were the combat controllers and the staffs of the 5th Army’s divisions and brigades. 

“Could you get me Sergeant Tupolev on the radio?” the General turned and asked his orderly. 

            The orderly nodded and picked up a receiver on the radio unit.  He punched a few digits into the keypad.  Once entered, the orderly signaled to the operator who he was, who he spoke for, and who he wished to communicate with.

            The Zakus were trailed by a team of mechanics in a hover truck.  In the event they needed to assist in repairs.  Though, the technology was far beyond anything the mechanics were accustomed.  There was little they could do.  In addition, a radio operator was attached to the hover truck of mechanics.  Since the Zakus were of particular interest to the General, the radio operator was there with a dedicated channel.  It was in place so the General could receive immediate reports on the Zakus.  Now, the General took the receiver from his orderly.

**000**

            Tupolev sat in the cockpit of Fields’ Zaku.  The mobile suit was still locked in the kneeling position from earlier.  A team of mechanics had every service panel pulled open, as they searched for the cause of the power outage.  Two of the mechanics had opened a rear access hatch and gawked in wonder at the power core.  It was like nothing they had ever seen before.  No engine they had ever worked on even resembled the core. 

To their limited expertise, the core appeared to be putting out power.  A diagnostic screen attached to the core indicated it was operating at full capacity.  Now, they had to figure out why the power was not reaching the other onboard systems.  That was the problem that vexed the mechanics.

“ _Call for you Tupolev_ ,” the operator in the hover truck radioed.  “ _General wants to speak with you_.”

“Fine,” Tupolev responded.  “Patch him through to my unit.”

            The operator switched a few buttons to change the transmission over to Tupolev.  The Sergeant carried a small personal radio that linked to the larger transmitter in the hover truck.  The personal radio was how the pilot could communicate with other Federation units and avoid using the onboard Zeon radio.

“This is Tupolev,” the Sergeant spoke.

“ _Sergeant,”_ the General began, coolly. _“This is General Frederickson. What is going on out there? Why aren’t you able to move?_ ”     

“Damn thing…I mean, sir, the unit is in a sort of power down mode. I believe it was accidently powered down by Fields.”

“ _So what can be done? From what I am told, you are the expert on these machines. Why aren’t you able to get it working?_ ”

“I am not the expert sir. That would be Lieutenant Leighton. He was the one who studied the weapon, he was the one who stole it, and he is the only one who could pilot it!”

            Tupolev uttered that bit out of frustration.  It took an instant to recognize that had been a mistake.  He was warned to forget that name.  Not fully thinking his actions through, Tupolev switched his radio off.

**000**

The General slammed the receiver onto the desk.  He was known for his cool and level head.  This outburst was uncustomary and rare.  Those who had seen the temper manifest knew, very well, that it was not good.  The General clenched his fists and turned to his orderly.  The orderly appeared terrified.

“Captain,” the General spoke firmly, the rage barely held back.  “Who is this Lieutenant Leighton?”

“I don’t know, sir,” the orderly responded.

“Well then, I want you to find out who that is. I want you to find out where they are. And I want this Lieutenant Leighton brought to that Zaku. Is that understood, Captain?”

            The Captain nodded in affirmation and set to work.  He raced from the stage to find a quartermaster, or a clerk from the personnel unit who might locate a service record.  Though the General had addressed only the Captain, the General’s other orderlies seated at the terminals knew they were also to assist in the search.  They began calling commanders to try and determine the Lieutenant’s identity.

**000**

Leighton balanced himself against the railing on the port side of the cruiser.  He stared over the water toward the ferocious battle that raged in the city.  Explosions lit up the afternoon sky.  The trails of plummeting aircraft crossed with the unguided missiles fired blindly by both sides.  The cool breeze from the sea was comforting in this heat, and it was a nice rest bit from the brig.  Still considered a patient, Leighton was evicted from his hospital bed to make room for the more seriously wounded.  He and the other fit patients were allowed to convalesce on the forward deck.  The cruiser switched from a role of fire support, to one as a hospital ship.  The wounded from the airport were ferried to the medical facilities on the cruiser and the other naval vessels anchored off shore.

            There was a continuous procession of small boats that approached the larger ships.  All were laden with a cargo of wounded men and women.  Leighton spotted a VTOL dropship making its way toward the flotilla.  He initially paid it no attention, but it seemed on a course with his ship.  The VTOL circled around and then set down on the landing pad.  Leighton returned to staring at the city.

“That’s him,” a nurse said, as she pointed at Leighton.

            A contingent of three MPs and a Feet Officer from the Office of Strategic Intelligence approached.  They were directed by the nurse.  Leighton became annoyed.  He rolled his eyes and turned to meet them.

“Lieutenant Horatio Leighton?” the OSI Officer spoke in a tone devoid of emotion. 

“Who wants to know?” Leighton responded, believing he was about to be taken to another facility.

“Are you Lieutenant Leighton or not?”

“Did I win the sweeps? Lucky me.”

            Leighton figured this was his last taste of freedom and fresh air.  He wanted to enjoy it and cause as much of an inconvenience to his captors as possible.  Therefore, he resolved to be difficult.

“You are to accompany us,” the Officer spoke again.

“But I am enjoying the sun?” Leighton joked.

“NOW!” the Officer barked.

            The MPs took that as their sign.  They moved over to Leighton and each of the MPs grabbed him by an arm.  He shook them off.

“Alright, you win” he said in compliance.

            The contingent, with Leighton amongst their number, proceeded toward the aft landing pad and the VTOL.  The pilots of the dropship kept the engines humming, ready.  When all were on board, the pilot throttled up and the VTOL took off.  They flew at a high speed back toward the airport.  Leighton was still convinced he was going to be transferred to another, more secure facility.  He had seen several Medea transports take off from the airport and assumed some intelligence officer found him a seat aboard one.  The only thing left to do was ponder his fate.

“So where am I bound for?” Leighton tried to get an answer.  “Cape Town internment camp or the Luna II penal facility?

“You’re not getting out of this fight, Leighton,” the Officer spoke.

            Leighton was confused by what that could mean.  As the Lieutenant pondered, the OSI Officer opened a satchel and passed a folder into Leighton’s hands.  Inside the folder was a hastily printed street map of the avenues that approached the city stadium from the south.  It was marked with red arrows from the Federation zones, indicating troop advancements.  At one intersection there was a large red circle with the hand written word “Zaku”.  The word had been underlined.  He began to think that maybe this incarceration had been postponed.   

“The Zaku you captured is in this intersection,” the Officer spoke and pointed on the map.  “Sergeant Tupolev is there with it. He tells us the unit has powered down and will not start back up.”

“And the other one?” Leighton inquired.  “I brought you two!”

“Destroyed.”

            The dropship banked wide to circumnavigate the air traffic above the runway.  This allowed the VTOL to land in a cleared area near the hangars, designated for craft of this type, so as not to interfere with the aircraft on approach.  The scene at the airport had reverted to its normal pandemonium.  When a Medea transport landed and taxied to the terminal, it was immediately swamped by a tide of desperate Federal soldiers who were eager to escape the hopeless struggle for the city. 

            A contingent of MPs, heavily armed with assault rifles and a light machine gun, formed a perimeter around the landing pad for the VTOL that carried Leighton.  They were in place to hold back any soldiers who attempted to climb aboard.  Also, Leighton needed safe escort to a vehicle in order to get him to the stricken Zaku.

            The Lieutenant was immediately rushed off of the dropship when it touched down.  The OSI Officer and MPs formed a protective formation around Leighton.  Only a few seconds had transpired, enough for the passengers to exit, before the VTOL took off again and was airborne.  Not a word was spoken, as the formation walked across the tarmac, through a service exit, and into a vehicle lot.  There, a hover truck sat idling, waiting for Leighton.  Three of the MPs, the OSI Officer, and Leighton all climbed aboard.  The truck’s fans increased power and the vehicle sped off for the front.

**000**

            Captain Takagi brought the column to a halt.  He, Sergeant Khan, of his Golf Company, and two privates crept forward to survey what lay ahead.  They were on the western edge of the stadium.  The small team concealed themselves in the ruined building.  Takagi took out his binoculars and was horrified.

            The city stadium sat in the middle of a large open park.  The Zeon had previously utilized the clearing as a landing zone for supply dropships.  Its strategic importance made it a key objective for the Federation advance.  When captured, Federation dropships could fly in supplies and reinforcements to the forward operating units.  The Zeon looked to be in control of the field.

            The burning hulks of a dozen Type 61 tanks pumped black plumes of smoke into the air.  A column of Zeon Magella tanks drove in a formation headed south.  Zeon infantry were scattered across the field picking through the bodies of Federation soldiers; collecting their weapons or pilfering souvenirs.  In the center of the field, next to the collapsed edge of the stadium, were three Zakus.  These Zakus were painted in the Zeon livery; these were the dreaded Zeon mobile suits. 

Takagi slowly lowered the binoculars.  Words were not needed to express the plight of the Army.  The evening sun began to set to their backs.  The stadium was only a few short blocks from where the Federation lines started.  It should be under their control, but it was not.  The 5th Army, by this time of day, expected to have driven deep into the Zeon lines.  Now, their own position was untenable; the attack had failed.  

The observation team slipped away from their post and back toward their men.  The column had concealed itself as best as it could.  The tanks were hidden from view; parked between the buildings.  The men had all sought cover in the ruins.  Takagi approached Paulson and the company commanders of his Battalion.  They all eagerly awaited the news.

“So, what’s the word?” Paulson started.  “They preparing a barbeque for us or what?”

“The Zeon control the field,” Takagi said, somberly.  “They’ve brought up armor and mobile suit support. It looks like our guys were cut to shreds.”

            The commanders were all speechless.  They had hoped to link up with friendly forces after a bloody and frustrating fight through the labyrinth of roadblocks and Zeon ambushes.  The men were exhausted and just wanted rest.  The news was crushing.

“Now what Captain?” Paulson asked the question on everyone’s mind.

            Takagi had everyone looking to him for a decision.  This was the make or break moment for the Captain, who had only been an academy cadet at the beginning of the month.  Now, the lives of the men under his command depended on the decision he made next.  The only option was to turn around and try to navigate the maelstrom back to the front line.

“We head south,” Takagi said.  “We keep to the cover of buildings moving quickly.”

“And what of the armor?” Paulson demanded.

“We leave it. We will move faster without having to detour for every roadblock we encounter.”

            There was uproar among the commanders.  Captain Soliani was there, commander of Jolliet Company.  He was bitter that the Battalion command had not passed to him; he worked to make things difficult for Takagi.

“The Zekes will gun us down without the support of the tanks,” Soliani proclaimed.

“I can’t just leave my tanks here,” interrupted Paulson.

“What about surrender?” a Lieutenant added.  “We have done more than has been expected of us. There is honor in surrender.”

“That is sedition!” Sergeant Khan shouted.

            The order had quickly deteriorated.  The commanders argued amongst themselves.  They were less concerned about taking orders from the young, recently commissioned cadet and more focused on their own preservation.  They seemed to lack confidence in Takagi’s ability to command.

“ENOUGH!” Takagi shouted, attracting everyone’s attention.  “The Battalion will form up and prepare to move out. We will abandon armor in order to make our advance more rapid. And, if there is any more talk of surrender, I will have the one responsible shot! Do we have an understanding?”  

            A silence overtook the group of officers.  They were stunned, and a bit frightened, by the outburst.  Takagi demonstrated that he was to be taken seriously and respected.  The officers each turned and nodded to Captain Takagi.  It was a showing that he was in command and demanded their loyalty.

            The orders were passed along to the men to prepare to move.  Takagi selected four men to advance ahead of the main column in order to scout the best avenue to the Federation lines.  The Captain knew the Federation front lines, at least only a few hours ago, were several blocks to the south of their current location. 

The column began their advance down a side street.  It was a narrow street, with buildings towering on either side.  It would have been impossible to get the tanks down this road.  The only obstruction the Federal soldiers encountered was the litter.  It was heaped in piles against the buildings, but proved not to be a significant hindrance.

They had traversed a few city blocks unopposed.  The spirits were high and they were confident they could make it.  Ahead, they spotted one of the forward scouts.  The scout was running at full speed back toward them.  Takagi halted the column.  Several shots rang out and the scout fell forward onto the street.  Her body lay motionless.

Zeon soldiers were spotted in the road ahead.  They skulked along the sides of the buildings; firing at the Federation column.  Takagi ordered his men to return fire.  The Federation soldiers in the front dropped to ground and lay prone; aiming and firing at the enemy.  Others spread out to find cover behind dumpsters, the piles of litter, or into the buildings themselves.  A few of the Federals fell, killed or wounded, where they stood.  Their bodies were quickly dragged from the street and into the nearest building.

Takagi aimed his M72A1and fired off several rounds.  He noticed an onrushing Zeon soldier stumble to the ground; confident he brought down the enemy.  The men of Takagi’s column kept up an intense fire on the Zeon.  They were in a desperate fight to escape and for their lives.  The held nothing back; men brazenly rushed forward to lob grenades at their Zeon foe.  Others would fire and advance toward the Zeon, determined to drive them back.  It was a resolve rarely shown by Federation soldiers thus far in the War.  It was an act of determination that needed to be repeated if the Earth Federation ever hoped to win.

The Federation soldiers took to the offensive, Takagi, at their helm, led them on.  Their boldness overwhelmed the Zeon force that opposed them.  The spacenoid infantry began to fall back.  A line of Zeon decided to hold their ground and stood defiant.  The charging Federation troops crashed upon them like a destructive storm surge. 

Both sides took to hand to hand combat.  The exhausted, desperate, and half crazed Federation soldiers fought like men possessed by the devil.  They clawed, wrestled, and took to physically beating their foes with bare hands.  Takagi found himself running full speed at a line of Zeon, the next; he was throttling life out of an enemy private.  The man’s face became stiff and lifeless, as the struggling ceased.  Takagi released the enemy from his grip. 

All around, soldiers clubbed or strangled each other.  A Federation soldier just left to Takagi was stabbing a Zeon.  The blade was thrust over and over into the enemy’s gut.  The pitiful Zeon coughed up blood and begged the attacker to stop.  The Federation soldier, Takagi recognized it was Bukowski, was in a panic.  It was Bukowski’s life, or the Zeon.  Tears welled up in Bukowski’s eyes, as he plunged the knife into the gut of the Zeon soldier for the final time.  He watched, as the enemy’s pleas for mercy ceased.

The Zeon attackers were on the run.  Takagi called for his men to regroup.  In the chaos, he did not realize how many casualties they had suffered.  There were twenty plus wounded soldiers that had been carried from the street and into the lobby on a hotel.  The column had only one medic in their number, and she was already critically short on medical supplies.  Some of the more critically wounded were in no condition to be moved.  Before Takagi could figure out what to do about the wounded, the Zeon forced a decision.

**000**

            The hover truck raced at a near reckless speed toward the stricken Zaku.  It was cramped inside the armored vehicle.  Unlike the command variant, the standard model was not build for the comfort of officers.  Rather, every bit of usable space was taken up by electronics or equipment stowage. 

            Leighton sat on top of a stack of ammunition crates, fastened down by a cargo net.  He fitted a flak jacket onto his torso, while the OSI Officer reluctantly handed over a pistol belt.  In his knees, the Lieutenant balanced a modified flight helmet used by crews on the RTX-65s.  A wire dangled out of the helmet; to be plugged into the radio affixed to the front of the flak jacket.

Visible from the small view slits on the hover truck was the chaotic scene outside.  There was a stream of wounded soldiers being carried from the front, either on stretchers or over the shoulders of their comrades.  On more than one occasion, the hover truck driver had to slam on the equivalent to brakes and bring the vehicle to an abrupt halt.  This happed on the multiple occasions when the road ahead became clogged with the wounded.  A Dopp fighter would fly low over the building and strafe the roads with its cannons.  The attacks had soldiers scrambling for cover against the sides of the ruined buildings.  The gunner aboard the hover truck furiously returned fire from the vehicle’s Vulcan.  It was clear the Zeon were gaining air superiority.

The hover truck came to another halt.  It was evident they had reached their destination when the side door opened.  The OSI Officer motioned Leighton to the door.  The Lieutenant stood up and climbed through the hatch and stepped onto the street.  The door was promptly shut behind him.  Once delivered, the OSI Officer and the MPs had fulfilled their obligation.  Now, they could return to the airport and figure out their own escape.

“Lieutenant!” Tupolev shouted.

            The Zaku, the one Leighton had stolen and Fields deactivated, knelt in the intersection.  Like a giant monument out of place in this warzone.  To the right, a collapsed building cradled the one Tupolev had crashed.  The Sergeant ran up to Leighton, excited to see the Lieutenant.  He wrapped his arms around his friend, embracing the Lieutenant in the welcoming hug of the Muscovites.     

“Misha,” Leighton replied, as he felt himself being crushed.  “It is…good to see…you too.”

“Er-sorry Lieutenant,” Tupolev said, as he released Leighton.

“So, you managed to fuck up my machine?”

“No, I broke mine. It was that Warrant Officer, who did this to yours.”

            Tupolev turned and pointed to the kneeling Zaku.  Another Dopp fighter screeched overhead.  The engines of the spacenoid fighter had a distinctive, unmistakable noise when it operated in this atmosphere.  The situation grew worse and the Federation forces in this area could not hold out much longer.  The Lieutenant and Sergeant had to work quickly, lest they be overrun by the Zeon.  Leighton, with Tupolev following closely behind, approached the base of the Zaku.

“The reactor is still operable?” Leighton asked.

“Da,” Tupolev replied.  “It has power, but I cannot get any response from other systems.”

Leighton climbed up a chain ladder that allowed access to the cockpit, several meters from the ground.  Once he scaled the ladder, Leighton climbed into the pilot seat.  Tupolev remained on the ground.  The Lieutenant began to type commands on a small keyboard attached to the Zaku’s main consol, by a pivot arm.  The commands were basic Zeon boot-up commands.  The same ones entered when a technician needed to access an operational system on one of the space colonies of Side 3.  Leighton had figured out the Zakus ran off of the same operating system the Zeon used on every computer that served a life support, mechanical, or operations task.  It was not difficult, for one accustomed, to learn its application on the Zaku.

“I think I got it,” Leighton said over his radio to Tupolev. 

 _“What do you mean?”_ Tupolev inquired.

“It was in power down mode. Remember when we encountered them the first time. The Zekes power them down for the orbital drop. That Warrant Officer fuck probably switched it off and didn’t realize it.”

_“Fuck me, right? The one thing I overlook! My apologies Lieutenant.”_

            The power coursed through the systems of the Zaku, the way blood would flow through a human body.  The systems began to activate one by one.  The ominous red glow of the ocular sensor began to sweep left to right.  Leighton brought up the results of the system diagnostic the computer ran upon activation.  It appeared everything was in working order.  The Lieutenant gave a “thumbs up” to the Sergeant, who responded in kind.  After the exchange, Leighton closed the cockpit hatch. 

Before proceeding, there was one item of business.  Leighton found the first aid kit to his left, above his head.  He opened the metal box.  The first aid supplies had been previously removed.  In their place, Leighton had stashed a flask of whiskey.  The Lieutenant took the flask in hand and began to drink.  He swallowed several gulps, before the harsh taste forced him to cough.  Once satisfied, Leighton returned the flask to the kit.

            Leighton brought the Zaku to a standing position and began to survey the area.  The soldiers in the street stopped what they were doing to gaze in a transfixed wonder at the mobile suit.  They watched, as the arms began to rotate and then the torso.  It was to check the range of motion and ensure the joints were operable.  Leighton recalled the instructions given to him on the ride to the front.

            The Officer from the Office of Strategic Intelligence briefed Leighton on the Army’s situation.  It was revealed that Operation Resilient Ridge, what they had called this attack, had turned into a complete disaster.  The Federation attacks were poorly coordinated and units had suffered heavy casualties.  The advance had devolved into a rout.  The order had been discreetly given to begin the evacuation of the 5th Army from Mogadishu.  They would slip away from their positions under the cover of darkness.  At 05:00 the next morning, a massive artillery barrage would commence in order to cover the Army’s final evacuation and hold the Zeon at bay.  The city was considered lost. 

General Frederickson wished to see the Zaku’s full might turned against the Zeon.  He hoped it would turn the tide of the battle, but he knew the situation was beyond that stage.  The orders Frederickson gave to the Office of Strategic Intelligence were; to have Leighton repower the Zaku and deliver it safely to the airport, once again.  From there, it would be loaded immediately onto a Medea transport and flown to the Federation base in Nairobi. 

             Leighton had the mobile suit up to full power.  Tupolev and the technicians in the hover truck prepared to move.  They would create a passage though the stream of wounded and defeated soldiers in order to allow the captured Zaku to travel safely.  The Lieutenant was ready to turn the mobile suit and begin the trek, when a familiar voice came over the radio.

“ _This is Captain Takagi_ ,” the voice began.  “ _To any Federal units in the area, help. We are holding position in a low-rise hotel, the Hotel Xeeb. We have many wounded who are unable to move. What is left of my Battalion is holding out against repeated Zeon attack. We are running critically short on ammunition. We need immediate evacuation. Does anyone copy?”_

   The transmission continued with similar requests being made.  Leighton had to pause.  His orders were to deliver the Zaku, and he realized he was in enough trouble already.  The thought of leaving those men there did not sit well with the Lieutenant.  Tupolev was monitoring the broadcast as well.  He interpreted the silence from Leighton as a decision.  Leighton activated the forward movement control of the Zaku.  The mobile suit took a step, but it was not trailing the hover truck back to the airport.  Leighton was taking the Zaku north, toward the enemy and Takagi.

**000**


End file.
